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Musk v Altman: Tech bros battle
00:17:27
Who actually wins after a courtroom battle between tech bosses Elon Musk and Sam Altman?
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- [00:00]
A
So two of the most powerful men in the tech world walk into a courtroom in California. One of them wins. But which one?
- [00:07]
B
I can't believe you're starting this show with a dad joke.
- [00:10]
A
Well, listen, it's better than most of my other jokes. We are, of course, talking about, on the one side, Elon Musk, one of the most powerful tech figures in the world.
- [00:21]
B
On the other, Michelle, Sam Altman from OpenAI. I mean, this is like a divorce playing out, and it's kind of parents fighting over who gets the good silver. Although in this case, of course, we're talking about AI.
- [00:33]
A
Yeah, well, if you keep criticizing my jokes, we could have some sort of divorce later on in this program. I think what we're gonna look at on this edition of Business Daily is the reputational damage to both men. I'm Rahul Tandon in the BBC studios here in the uk.
- [00:51]
B
And I'm Michelle Fleury in New York.
- [00:53]
A
And I have an empty chair next to me, Michelle, where Will Bain would normally be? He's gone off to watch some football in Istanb. Waste his money there. So who have we got instead this week then, Michelle?
- [01:04]
B
We have Lily Jamali, our very own North America technology correspondent, joining us with all of the kind of detail and gossip from the proceedings.
- [01:13]
C
I'm the one who's been cackling in the background to your. To your dad jokes this whole time. I thought they were funny.
- [01:20]
A
Yeah. Do you know what, Lily? You can come back on anytime. We don't need to, Michelle. On every week, if you ask me. For those who don't know, Lily, give us the background to this case. Why were these two powerful individuals who shape our life in court?
- [01:35]
C
Well, it was Elon Musk who brought all of us together as part of this lawsuit that he filed in 2024 against OpenAI. Sam Altman, the president of OpenAI, Greg Brockman and Microsoft as well. He was suing for $150 billion. He wanted to see an unwinding of OpenAI's for profit move over the years and also wanted Sam Altman and Greg Brockman ousted, claiming that Altman and company have looted a charity that he set up with them back in 2015. OpenAI, they created it together. And Musk made $38 million in donations in those early days. So that was the grounds upon which he was suing. It was ultimately OpenAI and company that won this case. This was a jury of nine Californians who ruled unanimously in less than two hours, by the way, that Elon Musk brought His lawsuit. Too late.
- [02:36]
B
So we're talking about winning on a technicality?
- [02:39]
C
We are. All they had to rule on was the statute of limitations, which basically nullifies the rest of the legal arguments here.
- [02:47]
B
Well, Raoul, you've had a busy week, because I know you've been speaking and getting reaction from sort of some of the kind of who's who, the cognoscenti of the tech world.
- [02:55]
A
Well, I spoke to Kara Swisher. She's very well known as a tech journalist. She's in the new Devil Wears Prada film as well. If you want to go and watch that. This is what she made of the case.
- [03:05]
D
The whole group of Silicon Valley are adult toddlers is what it says to me. And I'm sure the jury of normal people were like, who are these crazy people? A bunch of really sloppy, selfish, petty people fighting with each other over money. They already have. They have billions of dollars already, but they want billions more. You know, first of all, Elon, who has. Whose reputation has gone into the trash heap here in the States in terms of his behavior, is a giant toddler, essentially. Sam Altman comes across as possibly disingenuous. Maybe he's a little manipulative. I don't really care what they're like ultimately. I don't want them in charge of everybody. And that's the big issue here. That's the problem.
- [03:43]
B
Yeah, I mean, it's adult toddlers with God complexes. You know, it's classic Silicon Valley, right? You've got Elon Musk doing his maximum chaos routine. You've got Sam Altman kind of the tech saint, both fighting over a company that started as a charity but ended up as this huge cash machine. Is this now completely over? Lilly, given the central question wasn't answered,
- [04:08]
C
it will go on. Elon Musk has vowed to appeal. And I think this notion of it being thrown out, the case being thrown out on a technicality is going to be a big part of his case. The fact that the merits of the case have not been ruled upon, he thinks that's gonna work in his legal favor, and he's gonna elevate this case to the ninth Circuit Court of Appeals here in Northern California.
- [04:32]
A
Does it matter what they're like? I mean, who cares as long as they're good at what they do? If they're narcissists, if they're toddlers, if they produce a good product that we all use, what difference does it make?
- [04:44]
C
What was so interesting actually being at the courthouse was you also had all these protesters in addition to all these tech luminaries in their suits, not their hoodies. You had protesters outside expressing real concern, real backlash against both of these people, against Elon Musk and Sam Altman, because the work that they're doing, this development of AI, they say neither of these people should be the stewards of this important technology. They are concerned about impacts on jobs. We've already seen those impacts over the last year, plus impact on climate. Then when you are sitting in the courtroom listening to these people talk about how they are the good guys, that they are the right stewards for this very important technology, it was just such a contrast.
- [05:34]
B
I was reading something in the Verge, Lilly, which was talking about Musk versus Altman, and it shows that this was led by the wrong people. But what about OpenAI itself? Doesn't it leave it with a massive branding problem?
- [05:47]
C
OpenAI is possibly too big to fail at this point. I think there's people who would push back on that notion, certainly because they are also burning through cash. It takes a lot of money to pay your scientists to buy the infrastructure you need to develop AI. So there are people who think that that cash burn is just too severe for them to make it much longer. But, you know, at the same time, they continue to get investments from all corners. They are headed for an IPO to potentially value them at a trillion dollars. And so it's kind of hard to see how this thing might come off the tracks at this point. Yes, Sam Altman did suffer some personal reputational damage. He was painted as manipulative, as a liar. But he's still there, even after the trial. And I'm not hearing a lot of clamoring for him to go anywhere.
- [06:41]
B
I mean, there was that stunning moment, wasn't there, when he was testifying and he was asked whether he was trustworthy. It's almost like he had to think about that.
- [06:48]
A
And that must have some damage, doesn't it? Lily, I know that you've been at the court, outside the court. This is what OpenAI's lawyer, William Savitt, said when the case, much to Lily's delight, finally ended.
- [07:01]
E
What OpenAI has been and will become is an organization that, from top to bottom, is committed to its mission with a nonprofit organization in a control position, organizing the development of safe AI for the benefit of all humanity. That's what the message of today is.
- [07:20]
A
Okay, that might be the message, but is it going to be open? There's some other company. Is it the companies that weren't involved in the court case, both of you, that are going to be the winners. Is it, you know, is it Anthropic who weren't involved in the case, who think, great, let them square up to each other in court. We'll just calmly get on with our business?
- [07:37]
B
Yeah, I think Dario Amadei, the boss of Anthropic, is probably kind of rubbing his hands gleefully.
- [07:42]
C
No, Lily, I think he's been doing so for the last couple of months because he has just been on this amazing trajectory. This case kind of gives them even a little more momentum. But it's just been a great year all around for Anthropic.
- [07:57]
B
We just heard there from William Savitt, OpenAI's lawyer. I want to go back to kind of the other side, the argument being made by Elon Musk's lawyer, Mark Toboroff, who kind of described this, I guess, as a dangerous precedent.
- [08:12]
E
You have essentially a new formula for startups. You take publicly subsidized funds in the form of a charity, and when your ambitions require more money, you simply put all the fruits of that revenue, the technology in this case, into a for profit apparatus. And the directors and officers of the charity are enriched to the tune of billions. It's a brand new formula for Silicon Valley.
- [08:38]
B
A brand new formula. I mean, just to be a bit skeptical here, it does feel like they're both kind of putting out competing narratives, like the battle isn't over here.
- [08:48]
C
And I think that's a lot of what this whole case has really been about. You know, it is about the reputations of these two people. And that sort of takes me back to 2015, when Elon Musk's reputation was at its apex. Sam Altman was this up and comer. He was not a household name by any means. And OpenAI really helped elevate Sam Altman's status. Elon Musk, one of the sort of main arguments that we heard from OpenAI was that he's just mad that he didn't get to reap the benefits. He thought he was leaving OpenAI for dead when he quit the company in 2018. And then they end up doing very well and launching ChatGPT a couple years later. So for OpenAI, this is a case of sour grapes, not about charities or protecting the integrity of nonprofits across America, as Mark Toboroff laid out just there.
- [09:43]
A
Yeah, that is definitely their side of it. Must obviously had a very different side of it. You're listening to Business Daily from the BBC World Service. Today we're looking at the implication of Sam Altman's court victory over at Elon Musk this week. What does it mean for the companies involved with the two men? And more importantly, what does it mean for us and the future of AI? And that's where we're gonna get to now. And we're all very busy people cos Michelle not only is on this podcast, she has to go off and give the business news to all of you across the world. She's gonna have to go shortly. So let us look at that because why do we care about this case? Well, look, they are characters and they get us talking, but this is shaping our lives at the moment. AI. So not just what did it mean for these two, what has it meant for all of us? The way that this case has ended?
- [10:26]
B
I'm fascinated by the signal it sends to the rest of the tech world when you've got, you know, two such huge names involved in such a big, nasty and expensive and high profile visible fight. You know, if you are a startup trying to build AI, particularly if maybe you want to kind of pick up that mantle and make it for the good of humanity, good luck trying to survive the crossfire from, you know, these giants that are racing to dominate this industry. The other thing is also it proves in some ways that the wild west of AI isn't being tamed by government or anyone else. It sort of seems to be being led by billions, billionaire grudges and I think for, for people who are feeling skeptical about AI at the moment, and we've touched on that a bit and polls keep showing that Americans are increasingly, you know, less favorable in their opinions and their views of kind of the speed with which this is being developed. I think you're seeing that chasm growing even more from this trial.
- [11:24]
C
I think that, you know, we, when we first started looking at this trial, we were thinking about, you know, what are the implications for all of us, what are the implications for how artificial intelligence is shaping our lives. I think this really was a company news story in many ways about OpenAI. It is one of the biggest players in the AI race. If Elon Musk had gotten his way, he would have knocked out one of the biggest players, you know, clearing the way for Anthropic, but also his own AI startup, which remember he founded in 2023 x AI, which has been embroiled in all kinds of controversy and he would have potentially kneecapped a major competitor. That didn't end up happening here. And so what you really have at the end of it is a maintenance of the status quo. OpenAI being able to continue forward continue with its IPO plans. And so, in a sense, not a lot is changing. It's sort of a continuation of where we've been for the last couple of years.
- [12:26]
A
Michelle, I know you've got to go, so we're going to wave goodbye to you. Off you go and do your work on the tv. But thank you as always. Speak to you now. Next week we'll have Will back.
- [12:36]
B
Sorry to skate out before the end.
- [12:37]
A
No, no, no, no, no. Totally understandable. Lily. One of the things about this case is we don't like these two men. We don't want them running what is so important to which, which is so important in our lives. So who is going to run it? Is this the moment for more regulation, for governments across the world to say, hey, we're not going to let the tech Bros run this, we're not going to let China run this, we're going to have to do something about it. Is that where we're heading towards?
- [13:01]
C
I mean, I think if there is going to be regulation, it's going to come from your side of the pond and not mine. We've already seen that with Elon Musk's X AI. They were embroiled in controversy over the last year on a number of fronts. And the action, the meaningful action, the probes have all come from the eu, from France, from the uk. We have not done a lot here in the US at the federal level. Some states have tried to move in that direction. But I think what's so striking about this is that you're absolutely right. This really important technology is being controlled by just a couple of mostly men. And what we saw in this courtroom was just a lot of pettiness, a lot of personal animus towards one another. And you saw it in the emails, you saw it not just in the testimony.
- [13:55]
A
It's like kids in the playground, wasn't it?
- [13:57]
C
Yeah. You saw Musk, for example, offering to give his co founders at OpenAI Tesla Model Threes while they were negotiating how much control he would get. You have Sam Altman saying that at one point Elon Musk floated the idea of giving Open AI to his children were he to die. We learned that Musk offered his sperm to one of the executives at his companies when he saw that she didn't have kids who happen to also be a board member at OpenAI. I mean, it's just unbelievable. And then on Altman's side, we've heard of the manipulation, the alleged lying and you know, Musk's lawyer opening his questioning with questions about are you trustworthy? And just having a lot of fun with that. You could see the lawyer really enjoyed that line of questioning.
- [14:48]
A
So you have graphically there, once again described some of the bits of those court cases I recall following and sort of ended up with my jaw open at some of the stuff that was coming, coming out of it. But you know what struck me? Last night? On one of our business programs, I interviewed a young girl, a young student from Arizona University who'd been in the crowd as students jeered, booed Eric Schmidt, the former CEO of Google at the University of Arizona. They're all about to graduate, they're looking for jobs, they can't find any. And they booed him as he talks about AI and the impact it was having on society. And let's end with that. Is this where we are as a society now? We embraced AI. We thought, hey, I did. I thought, this is going to be great. I've got kids now. All I spend my time doing is thinking, is it going to take their jobs? Are our opinions of AI changing?
- [15:36]
C
I'm really glad you bring up the example of Eric Schmidt, the former CEO at Google, because I think it's a real sign of the times over at the University of California at Berkeley, there's a movement starting to get kids off of their social media. And I think there are some real parallels to draw because there's this sense that AI is in our faces, it's in our lives in ways we don't all want it to be. If I do a Google search now, I'm going to be served up something from AI, from Google, Gemini, whether I like it or not, whether I ask for it or not. And these kids on the Berkeley campus are saying we were basically guinea pigs for social media. And it's changed our brains, it's changed our social lives in ways that we're not happy with. And we just think that's really unfair and we want to spread the word. And I think this ties back into AI also, this idea that we are once again, all of us, kind of guinea pigs in this grand experiment being helmed by these billionaires. And I think there's a lot more awareness about the potential problems with just allowing tech to dominate our lives in particular ways. I think there's a lot more resistance to AI given the experience with social media than there would have otherwise been.
- [16:59]
A
Well, Lily, as always, thank you so much for joining. Of course, there is an appeal, Part two of the court case to come up. Lily will be following that very closely. Thanks to Michelle, of course, in New York, do subscribe to our podcast. Just search for BBC Business Daily wherever you get yours. And whilst you're there, please leave us a rating and review. We'd love to hear where you are listening to us. I'm Rahul Tandon. Thank you very much for listening.