The web/media representation of Stephen Wolfram somehow seems (I never had a chance to know him personally so I have no idea if he even creates such an impression, let alone actually does) like he has a "huge ego". Whenever someone produces such an impression (which can often be an unfortunate coincidence, I wouldn't expect popular ideas about people to be reliably related to their actual characters), "egos" of all the other people ignite in trying to demonstrate they are "more huge". All the reason and meaningful discussion is lost at this point, no matter how clever and educated the people involved are and what they actually achieved/contributed.
By the way I wish more people would create research institutes so there would be more free competition and less bureaucracy in research. There are many talented people who could do some useful/interesting research but ~80% of them probably won't manage with all the obstacles on the path to actual research (including the obstacles which effectively filter subjects and other parameters of research to what's trending in Nature).
Thank you for sharing this. I always imagined him this way but a confirmation by who met him personally produces a nice feeling. By the way an idea just hit me: Stephen Wolfram probably has a great understanding of how does popular image of a person evolves and lives loosely dependent on their real selves: to me it feels like it's a lot like the cellular automata he described in "A New Kind of Science". We can hardly produce a reliable and concise quantification of popular sentiment surrounding a person but if we could the mechanics would probably be similar.
I honestly think it is that his academic accomplishments in youth combined with the work he has done since is just triggering to people who have their identity wrapped up in being the smart kid. Since he names his companies after himself, knocking him for being "egotistical" is an easy attack to feel better about oneself for not having a PhD from Caltech at 20 with Feynman advising.
I have listened to hours of him on Lex Fridman and he doesn't come off as egotistical or arrogant in the least.
By the way I wish more people would create research institutes so there would be more free competition and less bureaucracy in research. There are many talented people who could do some useful/interesting research but ~80% of them probably won't manage with all the obstacles on the path to actual research (including the obstacles which effectively filter subjects and other parameters of research to what's trending in Nature).