“There is no question to anyone following this case in detail that Altman & Brockman essentially enriched themselves by stealing from charity,” Elon Musk wrote, hitting the ground running after losing his massive lawsuit against his estranged OpenAI co-founders Sam Altman and Greg Brockman.
Tossing Trump’s caps, the sometimes richest man added: “The only question is when they do it!”
A few hours after a federal judge and jury rejected Musk’s 2024 lawsuit for breach of trust and illegal enrichment against the OpenAI CEO and president (and Microsoft), the owner of X took to his social media platform to criticize the results.
Apparently PO’d by a nine-judge panel and Oakland-based Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers insisting on the statute of limitations to block his desire to regain control of the ChatGPT home, fire Altman and Brockman and more, Musk blamed everyone and supported his lawyers’ promises of an appeal.
“This shows why the decision by the activist judge in Oakland, who just used the judge as a fig leaf, sets such a bad precedent,” Musk said on Twitter. “You’ve just given a free license to loot charities if you can keep the looting quiet for a few years!”
Viewing the image of restrictions as somehow unfair and staying at a company that shouldn’t work for him, Musk continued: “Regarding the OpenAI case, the judge and jury have never ruled on the merits of the case, only on the technology of the calendar.”
“There is no question to anyone following this case in detail that Altman & Brockman actually enriched themselves by stealing from charity,” he added in a second tweet, repeating his core allegation that Altman and the gang were pirates when they opened a portion of OpenAI’s profits in 2019. “The only question is WHEN THEY DID IT!”
Founded in 2015 by Musk (who invested $50 million before he left in 2018), Altman and Brockman, OpenAI has been working for months on an expected $1 trillion IPO that could shatter Wall Street records. Musk’s lawsuit and the three-week trial could derail that massive stock offering. Now, the legal restraints are off, Altman has the upper hand, and Musk knows it.
“I will be appealing to the Ninth Circuit, because making an example of philanthropy is deeply damaging to philanthropy in America,” Musk wrote, hoping to get Gonzalez Rogers’ petition dismissed. “OpenAI was created for the benefit of all mankind.”
Jaap Arriens/NurPhoto via Getty Images
Maybe, but as the founder of his AI company and Trump’s recent China tagalong trip Musk knows, that’s no longer the case.
Musk knows, or should know, that, as much as he hates Altman and the calculations he has to make in a crowded environment – including Anthropic, Perplexity AI, Google’s efforts, corporate executives from China, and key stakeholders of OpenAI Microsoft – humanity has many advantages and dangers that exist in their digital future.
