•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Technology tycoons Elon Musk and Sam Altman are set to face off in a civil trial scheduled to begin Monday with jury selection, centered on Musk’s allegations that OpenAI leadership betrayed the company’s founding mission as it evolved from a nonprofit into a for-profit venture.
The dispute traces back to OpenAI’s 2015 origins, when it was established as a nonprofit startup primarily funded by Musk before later shifting toward a capitalistic structure. OpenAI is now valued at $852 billion, according to the article.
Musk, the world’s richest person, filed an August 2024 lawsuit that will be decided by a jury and US District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in Oakland, California. The lawsuit accuses Altman, OpenAI’s CEO, and Greg Brockman, a top lieutenant, of double-crossing Musk by moving away from the company’s founding goal of serving as an altruistic steward of a revolutionary technology.
Musk alleges that Altman and Brockman shifted into a moneymaking mode behind his back. OpenAI has rejected the claims, describing them as unfounded and aimed at undermining its growth while boosting Musk’s xAI, which he launched in 2023 as a competitor.
Judge Gonzalez Rogers said earlier this year that she believed the case merited a trial, including because of how a jury would view the credibility of the people who will testify. The judge will make the final decision, with the jury serving in an advisory role.
Musk invested about $38 million in OpenAI from December 2015 through May 2017. At the time of filing, he sought more than $100 billion in damages.
However, the article says damages are now likely to be much smaller after pre-trial rulings that went against Musk. Musk has since abandoned a bid for damages for himself and is instead seeking an unspecified amount of money to be paid to fund the charitable efforts of OpenAI’s nonprofit arm. The funding would be paid primarily by OpenAI’s for-profit operations and by Microsoft, which became OpenAI’s biggest investor after Musk cut off his funding.
The lawsuit also seeks Altman’s removal from OpenAI’s board.
Musk’s decision to stop funding OpenAI contributed to a bitter falling out with Altman. Musk says he was responding to deceptive conduct that the OpenAI board identified when it fired Altman as CEO in 2023, before he was reinstated days later.
The trial carries risks for Musk, the article notes, after he was held liable by another jury last month for defrauding investors during his $44 billion takeover of Twitter in 2022. It also says any damaging details about Musk’s business tactics could be particularly consequential because SpaceX plans to go public this summer in an initial public offering that could make him the world’s first trillionaire.
The article describes the trial as expected to produce “riveting theater,” with contrasting testimony from two influential and polarizing figures.
It says Gonzalez Rogers ruled that Musk cannot be questioned during the trial about suspected ketamine use, but the judge is allowing questioning about Musk’s attendance at the 2017 Burning Man festival in Nevada, described as a free-wheeling event known for widespread drug use. The judge is also allowing questioning about Musk’s relationship with former OpenAI board member Shivon Zilis, described as the mother of several of his children.
Altman, who the article says is currently worth roughly $3 billion, did not emerge widely in public consciousness until the late 2022 release of ChatGPT. The resulting AI boom has led some to compare him to J. Robert Oppenheimer, the nuclear bomb inventor.
The article also says Altman has faced blowback amid concerns about AI’s potential dangers. It cites a New Yorker profile earlier this month portraying him as an unscrupulous executive, and it notes that days later a 20-year-old man worried about AI’s effect on humanity was arrested on attempted murder charges after throwing a Molotov cocktail at Altman’s San Francisco home.
The article says the testimonies are expected to shed light on thinking that helped trigger the AI race and on the unraveling of Musk and Altman’s friendship. It states that their kinship was forged in 2015 when they agreed to build AI in a more responsible and safer way than profit-driven companies controlled by Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, according to evidence submitted ahead of the trial.
It also says details of the break were reflected in a February 2023 email exchange included in evidence. In one message, Altman tells Musk: “I am tremendously thankful for everything you’ve done to help — I don’t think OpenAI would have happened without you — and it really hurts when you publicly attack OpenAI.” Musk responds: “I hear you and it is certainly not my intention to be hurtful, for which I apologize, but the fate of civilization is at stake.”
Premium gym chains are entering a “golden era” that is ending or already in decline, as rising operating costs collide with shifting consumer preferences toward more flexible, community-based ways to exercise. Long-term memberships are shrinking, margins are pressured by higher rents and facility expenses, and competition from smaller, more personalized…
