The palace intrigue in the tech world: The power game of Musk, Ultraman, and OpenAI

Written by: Grace Kay, Sarah Jaskon

Compiled by: MetaverseHub

Musk and Altman-led AI companies (referring to xAI and OpenAI) have been in fierce competition, with both sides recently publicly attacking each other. However, this is only part of the truth.

A few years ago, the two co-founded OpenAI. Today, Altman leads OpenAI, while Musk left OpenAI, which later birthed ChatGPT, in 2018 to create his own AI company, xAI, and recently launched its AI chatbot, Grok.

Now, Musk is suing Altman and OpenAI, claiming they betrayed the founding principles of the company, which aimed to open-source AI technology and committed to being a "non-profit organization that benefits humanity."

In fact, the complicated relationship between Musk and Altman has spanned many years.

In 2015, Musk and Altman, along with Peter Thiel, LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, and Y Combinator co-founder Jessica Livingston, among other Silicon Valley figures, co-founded OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT.

According to a statement on the OpenAI website dated December 11, 2015, the organization aimed to create a non-profit focused on "developing artificial intelligence in a way that is most likely to benefit all of humanity."

At that time, Musk stated that artificial intelligence was humanity's "greatest existential threat."

Another statement announcing the establishment of OpenAI read: "It is hard to imagine how much benefit human-level AI could bring to society, and it is equally hard to imagine how much harm it could cause if developed or used improperly."

01. Musk Resigned from OpenAI's Board in 2018

OpenAI stated in a blog post at the time, "As Tesla continues to focus more on AI, this will eliminate potential conflicts for Musk in the future," adding that Musk would continue to provide guidance and donations.

A relevant source revealed that with Musk's departure, he also relinquished his commitment to provide additional funding to OpenAI.

Altman stated in an interview, "It was very difficult; I had to readjust my life and time to ensure we had enough funding."

Reports indicate that in 2023, Altman and other co-founders of OpenAI rejected Musk's proposal to manage the company made in 2018.

Semafor reported that Musk wanted to run the company alone, trying to beat Google. However, after his proposal to manage the company was rejected, Musk promptly withdrew his funding and left the OpenAI board.

In 2019, Musk shared some insights about his decision to leave, stating that one reason was that he "disagreed" with OpenAI's direction.

Musk wrote on Twitter, "I had to focus on solving a lot of engineering and manufacturing issues at Tesla and SpaceX."

"Additionally, Tesla was also competing for some of the same talent as OpenAI, and I disagreed with some of the things the OpenAI team wanted to do. All of this combined, it was best for us to part ways amicably."

02. Musk Has Criticized OpenAI Multiple Times After Leaving

Two years after his departure, Musk responded to an article from MIT Technology Review, stating, "OpenAI should be more open."

The article reported that while OpenAI frequently claims to be committed to transparency, there exists a "culture of secrecy."

Musk also added, "There is not much confidence in Dario's safety," referring to Dario Amodei, who was leading OpenAI's strategy at the time.

In December 2022, just days after OpenAI released ChatGPT, Musk stated that the company had accessed Twitter's (now owned by Musk) database in advance to train its AI chatbot, while Musk was putting this work on hold.

Musk believed that OpenAI, which started as open-source and non-profit, needed to further understand its future governance structure and revenue plans, but clearly, neither had been achieved. At the same time, Musk was very angry about ChatGPT's success.

In November 2022, ChatGPT skyrocketed, winning millions of users' favor, capable of everything from essay writing to basic coding.

In February 2023, Musk doubled down, stating that the current OpenAI "is completely not what I intended."

"OpenAI was created as an open-source (which is why I named it 'Open' AI), non-profit organization, aimed at competing with Google, but now it has turned into a closed-source, profit-maximizing company that is effectively controlled by Microsoft. This is completely contrary to my intentions."

A month later, Musk reiterated this claim.

"I still don't understand how the non-profit organization I donated about $100 million to became a for-profit organization valued at $30 billion. If this is legal, why doesn't everyone do it?"

03. Musk Turned His Complaints into a Lawsuit

He sued OpenAI, Altman, and co-founder Greg Brockman, claiming that the company's direction in recent years violates its founding principles.

His lawyers stated that OpenAI "has become the de facto closed-source subsidiary of the world's largest tech company" and that "it is perfecting a general artificial intelligence (AGI) to maximize profits for Microsoft, rather than benefiting humanity."

OpenAI has not responded to requests for comments on the lawsuit.

04. Altman Addressed Some of Musk's Grievances with OpenAI

Altman stated last year, "To say something positive about Musk, I think he genuinely cares about the bright future of AI."

"I mean, Musk is a jerk, no matter how you want to say it. His style is not the style I want, but I think he really cares; he is very anxious about the future of humanity."

Regarding Musk's claim that OpenAI has become "a closed-source, profit-maximizing company effectively controlled by Microsoft," Altman also provided an explanation: "Most of the claims are not true; I think Elon knows that."

Despite Musk's "obvious attacks" on OpenAI on Twitter, Altman still referred to Musk as one of his heroes.

In March 2023, during Lex Fridman's podcast, Altman stated, "Elon is clearly attacking us from several different angles on Twitter."

Nevertheless, he still called Musk one of his heroes and added, "I believe Musk feels a lot of pressure regarding AGI safety, which is understandable. I have learned some 'super valuable' lessons from him."

According to Fortune magazine, during a speech at University College London in May, Altman was asked what he learned from different mentors. He mentioned Musk in his response.

"Of course, I learned from Musk what is possible, and that you don't have to accept the fact that hard R&D and tough technology are things you can ignore; that is very valuable."

Musk had signed an open letter signed by over 1,000 people, calling for a six-month pause on training advanced AI systems.

The letter was also signed by several AI experts, raising concerns about the potential risks of AI to humanity.

The letter stated, "We should only develop powerful AI systems when we are confident that they will have a positive impact and that their risks are manageable."

However, according to a recent report by The New Yorker, while Musk publicly called for a pause, he was quietly building his own AI competitor, xAI.

Afterward, Musk briefly unfollowed Altman on Twitter, only to follow him again later. Additionally, Altman later mocked Musk for calling himself a "free speech absolutist."

Recently, Twitter banned users from retweeting or replying to tweets containing links to competitor Substack, only to reverse that decision. Altman sarcastically wrote in response to a tweet about this situation, "What a pinnacle of absolute free speech."

Altman joked that he would watch the rumored cage fight between Musk and Zuckerberg.

He stated at the Bloomberg Technology Summit in June this year, "If he and Zuck really do it, I would go watch." However, he also mentioned that he didn't think he would challenge Musk in a melee.

Altman also reiterated his previous comments about Musk's stance on AI.

"He really cares a lot about AI safety; we have some disagreements in certain areas, but we both care about this issue, and he wants to ensure that our world has the best chance of a good outcome."

Additionally, Altman recently told The New Yorker that Musk takes a maverick approach to broader issues.

"Musk is eager for the world to be saved. But the condition is that he must be the one to save the world."