/Tech4h ago

Google DeepMind's Susan Zhang argues politically influential figures often receive post-facto credit for technical breakthroughs they did not develop

Story Overview

Susan Zhang from Google DeepMind points out that in AI work demanding massive compute and capital, recognition often flows to politically connected figures after the fact, mainly to unlock internal sign-offs and fresh resources rather than reflect who actually built the systems.

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#84

Original post

Susan Zhang@suchenzang

in a (social/compute)-capital intensive game, there's a funny dynamic that happens

where "politically-influential" figures in an org are bribed with credit attribution after the fact (authorship on paper, public viz on podcasts/blogs, etc) in order for a "breakthrough" to land/be released/be published/be given compute resources for scaling up

of course these figures became influential back in the day for some other reason, and can in theory be competent themselves as well

but at this point they generally have nothing to do with the successes/failures they talk about, which gets exponentially worse the longer their tenure becomes

maybe this is just how the way the world works with a rich-get-richer fame effect (after all, they can still attract new fresh talent who believe their public image hook, line, and sinker)

but i sometimes wonder if an entire economy / tech-bubble ends up being built on stolen valor*

what the long-term consequences may be

(maybe nothing!)

-----

*those not built on stolen valor have the other hairy problem of creative financial and legal engineering that is way beyond my ability to speculate on

9:21 PM · May 15, 2026 · 24.1K Views

Funding Driver

How influence turns into a resource lever

Zhang describes the pattern as pragmatic: attaching visible names helps clear funding hurdles and scale decisions even when those names had little to do with the original engineering, raising the question of how much the field depends on this kind of lubrication.

Open Question

The longer arc once credit floats free

She flags the risk that sustained detachment between credit and contribution could normalize an economy built on borrowed valor, though she leaves open whether early competence in some cases fades into later detachment or was never central to begin with.

Sentiment

Positive users praise the inspirational role of heroes in AI research and commend posts critiquing hero culture, while negative users accuse participants of pushing political agendas or seeking undue credit for breakthroughs.

Pos

66.6%

Neg

33.4%

5 comments with sentiment.

Cluster Engagement

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Posts from X

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Susan Zhang@suchenzang

my only contribution to the field is to tell the kids santa isn't real and there are no heroes anywhere

(at this stage of the game, if you have "heroes" saving the day, it says more about the piss-poor state of the day than the heroes themselves)

Susan Zhang@suchenzang

was never the case everywhere i've been at by the time i got there

some got credit for "executive support behind the scenes" (might've been too beneath them to contribute any hands-on execution time)

some were for publication approval

some are so legendary that every accomplishment from thousands of people around them are attributed to their own personal doing (which, relatively speaking, might not be the worst thing)

it's pretty much the name of the game to bribe and do whatever you need to do to lube up landing your work in such a capital-intensive field

but at some point, maybe it's worth playing a different game with a different set of rules...

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Mark Saroufim@marksaroufim

Hero Killer Stain spoke about this, heroes are fake, hero society is rotten and he wanted to force the world to admit it.

But Hero Killer Stain did not try to reform institutions or persuade the public, his kit was geared towards 1:1 ambushes, he would execute the fake heroes. If you strip away the branding, the rankings, the sponsorships, when there is no reward, he was forcing the question: are you still a hero?

Stain's ideology was so compelling, a society that turns that turns heroism into status will inevitably produce frauds and Stain outright rejected this.

But ultimately Stain was wrong, exposure is not truth and punishment is not justice. He believed in one true hero All Might but All Might also became a monopoly on hope, the symbol of peace, he was so overwhelmingly powerful and morally righteous that no-one else would learn to step up.

Citizens outsourced their courage to All Might, institutions offloaded responsibility and Stain mistook the shadow cast by All Might for proof that everyone standing in it was worthless.

The answer is not there are no heroes, that's surrender and neither is it there is one perfect hero that's worship and makes society fragile.

The world needs heroes. Not idols or messiahs. Heroes. People who step up and do the right thing without needing to be the main character.

Susan Zhang@suchenzang

my only contribution to the field is to tell the kids santa isn't real and there are no heroes anywhere

(at this stage of the game, if you have "heroes" saving the day, it says more about the piss-poor state of the day than the heroes themselves)

3h6K4215

Susan Zhang@suchenzang

@marksaroufim @pangram

3h35681

Susan Zhang@suchenzang

@marksaroufim @pangram 🥸🫣🤌🥲

3h773

Mark Saroufim@marksaroufim

@suchenzang @pangram I promise I edited it and it took me a good 10 min to write this shitpost

3h5611

secemp@secemp9

@marksaroufim there is always a more pragmatic approach

3h301

Mark Saroufim@marksaroufim

@suchenzang @pangram

3h873

alex zhang@a1zhang

@marksaroufim I had to do a double take when I saw MHA on my feed

1h1102

sasuke⚡420@sasuke___420

@suchenzang no no kris cao is my hero and sentencepiece still doesn't really come with usable data loaders

3h1101

Cristian Garcia@cgarciae88

@marksaroufim love your post-meta arc

2h262

TMZ@tozhou

@suchenzang the kids love it and break out of the VR

4h175

Gautam@gautamgoel978

@suchenzang @marksaroufim @pangram when will bot reply from pangram

3h491

yash@yashetal

@suchenzang Capital intensive games always attract the credit vultures as players.

1h161

QL@KP199943

@suchenzang the lessons has to be learned the hard way.

and you should write a book (I think)

I always wondered if a lot of things I experienced was universal or not

3h26

Dhruv@dhruvrnaik

@marksaroufim Best thing I've read today

2h13

Kasias@Sam83614928026

@suchenzang You lowkey push some CCP normalization agenda as well. We don’t forget that China is still a police state and runs human concentration camps to this day.

3h12

Ω.KendrickPlumard@fouriergalois

@suchenzang but heroes don't exist only to set an example for us. they give us the courage to continue the fight when times are tough.

2h11

M4rc0z@dreamworks2050

@suchenzang @marksaroufim @pangram

3h11

arch rock@silverhawk_ny

@suchenzang Are you referring Norm 's leaving to OAI? Is the story his optimizer fix save Gemini true?

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