Sam Altman told the court Elon Musk sought total control of OpenAI from the start |
Sam Altman told the court Elon Musk sought total control of OpenAI from the start
Altman spent about four hours on the stand, saying Musk abandoned the company rather than having his charity stolen from him
JOSH EDELSON / Getty Images
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman testified Tuesday that Elon Musk wanted total control of OpenAI in its early days, pushing back on Musk's central claim that Altman and other executives betrayed the company's charitable mission by steering it toward a for-profit structure.
During his roughly four hours of testimony, Altman told the court that Musk had insisted on holding majority control over any for-profit version of OpenAI, offering only a vague promise that his ownership share would shrink as time went on. Altman testified he did not believe Musk would step back. "My belief is he wanted to have long-term control and that he would have had that had we agreed to the structure he wanted," Altman told the court.
According to Altman, two factors drove Musk's push for dominance: a general unwillingness to trust others with consequential decisions, and a rule Musk had adopted for himself........