All the employees wanted to simply get rich and support Sam Altman's and his mission to get them there (why else would be a revolt upon his firing?) so with that in mind, I can't help but to think that self-deception is the best weapon people have to use a facade for their greed.
I frankly have more respect for scammers, at least they know firmly where they stand on a moral spectrum.
I don't find it hard to believe that they in fact wanted to build something new and innovative AND get rich in the process. Which is not unreasonable and no "self-deception" needs to be involved in the process. OpenAI would be dead in the war if they stuck to their principles.
> I frankly have more respect for scammers, at least they know firmly where they stand on a moral spectrum.
Why? You need massive amounts of money and resources to build something useful. Especially in tech private for profit enterprises seem to be best positioned to achieve that (the same applies to opensource, Linux etc. would be a niche project with limited usefulness without corporate backing).