The long-standing feud between Elon Musk and Sam Altman has been a spectacle of online jabs and recriminations for years. However, it has mostly been two tech-bros lashing at each other online in the form of accusations, counter-accusations, and jibes.
But on Tuesday, the online beef shifted to a much higher-profile forum. But on Tuesday, the dispute escalated to a federal courtroom in California, where a month-long trial will scrutinize their row. Musk claims Altman, with whom he co-founded OpenAI, has swindled him out of millions and betrayed ChatGPT’s original non-profit mission.
Musk is also suing Microsoft, which he alleged aided in the scheme to monetize the company. Microsoft has repeatedly denied the claims. Musk is seeking billions of dollars in what his lawyers call “wrongful gains” that he wants used to fund OpenAI’s non-profit arm. He wants to see a shake-up at the company, including the ousting of Altman.
OpenAI counters that Musk is driven by jealousy and regret over walking away from the company. OpenAI also accuses Musk of trying to sabotage one of his key rivals in the Artificial General Intelligence space.
A nine-person jury, sworn in on Monday, will decide the outcome under Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers’ oversight. The federal courthouse in Oakland will afford the billionaires “no special treatment,” Rogers has promised.
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The Problem With Jury Selection
The long-standing feud between Elon Musk and Sam Altman has been a spectacle of online jabs and recriminations for years. However, selecting the jury was proving to be a challenging task. A lot of the prospective jurors already held an opinion about Elon Musk, and it was not a favorable one.
A Verge reporter quoted statements from juror questionnaires: “Elon Musk is a greedy, racist, homophobic piece of garbage.” “Elon Musk is a world-class jerk.” “I very much dislike Tesla. As a woman of color, I am very aware of the damaging statements and actions Elon Musk has enacted and been a part of.”
Musk’s lawyers raised the issue that some people already hold a negative opinion of Musk and tried to get them struck from the pool of possible jurors. However, Judge Rogers said, “The reality is that people don’t like him… Many people don’t like him, but that doesn’t mean that Americans cannot have integrity for the judicial process.”
While the responses above may not reflect the opinions of the nine people selected for the jury, the chosen group includes some who said they may not like Musk or have negative opinions about AI technology, but wouldn’t let that interfere with their view of the facts of the case.
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A Colorful Clash of the Tech Titans
The animosity between Musk and Altman has been simmering since the lawsuit was filed. Last year, Musk offered to buy OpenAI for $97.4 billion, but the company rejected the offer. Altman then posted on Musk’s social media platform X, “No thank you, but we’ll buy Twitter for $9.74 billion if you want.” “Swindler,” replied Musk in a comment on Altman’s post.
The trial will feature testimony from Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, former OpenAI scientists Mira Murati and Ilya Sutskever, and former OpenAI board member Shivon Zilis, who is also the mother of four of Musk’s children.
Colourful details about the private lives of billionaires have trickled out in the run-up to trial as attorneys wrangle over the evidence and testimony that should and shouldn’t be shared with the jury. The Tesla boss’s use of “rhino ket,” as it’s known in Silicon Valley parlance, for instance, will not be allowed in court.
Musk’s lawyers have also made news. One of his lawyers has been moonlighting as a clown in his downtime, according to Business Insider. Another, who’s a Hollywood producer on the side, was recently profiled by Vanity Fair magazine.
This trial comes as the public is only beginning to grapple with AI’s complex entry into our lives. Both men have been at the forefront of bringing it to consumers. The trial could offer new insights into their ambition and intent in developing a technology now used by a growing subset of the global population.
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