Sam Altman's casual typing style, which he shares with other tech leaders like Jack Dorsey, has become a signature move in Silicon Valley, but the OpenAI CEO now acknowledges it creates a credibility problem when discussing existential questions about artificial intelligence. After spending a week typing exclusively in lowercase, a Business Insider reporter discovered that while the informal style feels authentic and conversational, it may actually undermine how seriously people take important messages, especially when those messages concern the future of humanity .

Why Are Tech Leaders Abandoning Capital Letters?

The lowercase typing trend has become surprisingly common among powerful executives in Silicon Valley. Altman, Block CEO Jack Dorsey, Y Combinator CEO Garry Tan, and numerous other tech leaders have adopted the practice of writing without capital letters or punctuation. The style emerged as a way to seem more approachable, conversational, and authentic compared to formal corporate communication .

Dorsey famously wrote his entire 600-word announcement of massive layoffs at Block in lowercase, beginning with "i'll be straight about what's happening." Altman has used the style in critical moments, including when he texted Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella during his 2023 firing and rehiring crisis, writing "how about: satya and my top priority remains to save openai" .

The appeal is clear: lowercase feels less formal, less hierarchical, and more human. It suggests the writer is too busy or too important to worry about grammar rules. But this casual approach carries unexpected consequences, particularly when discussing serious topics.

Does Lowercase Communication Damage Credibility on Critical Issues?

Altman himself has begun to question whether his typing habit undermines his message. In a recent conversation with the Business Insider reporter, he acknowledged the tension between his communication style and his message about artificial intelligence's world-changing potential .

"it feels weird to talk about how superintelligence is going to reshape society and still not use capitals and punctuation," Altman stated. "i had a moment where i was writing about how much the world was going to change and felt like it deserved capital letters. but i dont know if it will stick."

Sam Altman, CEO at OpenAI

Altman told the reporter he is "trying to change to upper case" but finds it difficult, describing his lowercase habit as making him "feel unserious." This admission is significant because it reveals that even tech leaders who have adopted the style recognize its limitations when addressing matters of genuine consequence .

Altman

Etiquette experts are far less forgiving. Thomas Farley, an etiquette consultant whose clients include JPMorgan, Estée Lauder, and the US Army, calls lowercase typing "careless" and "affected." He argues that executives who type in lowercase send a clear message to their readers: "You're not important enough for me to put in the effort" .

"There's a kind of a built-in supposition on the part of the writer that 'I'm above punctuation and convention and therefore you, my recipient, need to deal with this, interpret where my thoughts begin and end, decipher my abbreviations, and that's your problem,'" Farley explained.

Thomas Farley, Etiquette Consultant

Mary Norris, a copy editor and The New Yorker's longtime "Comma Queen," adds that lowercase is simply "hard to read. To me, it looks like alphabet soup." She also notes that contrary to the assumption that lowercase saves time, it often takes longer to write in lowercase and shorthand .

How to Navigate Professional Communication in the Age of Lowercase

• Context Matters: Lowercase may work for internal Slack messages where volume and speed are prioritized, but formal announcements, policy statements, and discussions about existential risks require standard capitalization and punctuation to convey seriousness and respect for the audience.
• Authenticity vs. Performativity: Communications expert Lulu Cheng Meservey, who has worked with tech leaders including Altman, notes that "there's no good or bad personal syntax, just avoid being performative." Leaders like Altman and Dorsey have used lowercase consistently for years, but newer practitioners who deliberately turn off autocorrect to adopt the style may appear to be copying a trend rather than expressing genuine communication preferences.
• Audience Perception Varies by Generation: While lowercase is ubiquitous on Slack and among younger workers, some recipients find it unprofessional or even off-putting. Two female Gen Z coworkers interviewed for the story called lowercase "an epidemic among Brooklyn men" and described it as "an instant red flag" in dating contexts, suggesting the style's acceptability depends heavily on the relationship and medium.

The average Slack user sends nearly 100 messages per day, which may explain why lowercase has become normalized in workplace chat platforms. The sheer volume of communication makes hitting the shift key feel like an unnecessary burden. Additionally, the informal tone of lowercase messages may help soften the impact of urgent evening requests, making a 9 p.m. message asking "hey how r u feeling abt rfk?" feel less demanding than "Where are we on the RFK Jr. story?" .

However, the stakes change dramatically when the topic involves artificial intelligence policy, safety concerns, or responses to violence. After a man threw a Molotov cocktail at Altman's San Francisco home and The New Yorker published a damaging profile of him, the CEO posted a thousand-word blog addressing both incidents. Notably, in this serious statement, Altman capitalized all 26 instances of the pronoun "I," signaling a shift toward more formal communication when the situation demanded it .

The broader context matters here. Altman's credibility challenges extend beyond his typing habits. OpenAI has faced significant reputational damage in recent weeks, including the Pentagon partnership that sparked a "QuitGPT" campaign causing ChatGPT uninstalls to spike by 295% in a single day, while competitor Anthropic's Claude reached number one on the US App Store for the first time . The New Yorker investigation portrayed Altman as "an untrustworthy, power-hungry leader," adding to the pressure on his public image .

Meanwhile, Anthropic has positioned itself as the responsible alternative through its "safety first" messaging. The company delayed the release of its Claude Mythos Preview model, citing cybersecurity risks, which boosted its reputation and valuation at OpenAI's expense. Anthropic's implied valuation on private secondary markets recently surged past OpenAI's, suggesting that controlling the narrative around AI safety may be as important as the technology itself .

For Altman, the lowercase habit is just one element of a larger credibility challenge. As he prepares for OpenAI's planned stock market listing toward the end of the year at a valuation of $852 billion, every communication choice matters. Whether he can successfully transition to more formal communication while maintaining his authentic voice remains an open question, but his own admission that lowercase feels "unserious" when discussing superintelligence suggests he understands the stakes .