OpenAI Trial Sequel: Musk's Rage, Tesla's Lifeline, and the "Haunted House Meeting" Inside Story

Original｜Odaily Planet Daily (@OdailyChina)

Author｜Wenser (@wenser2010)

On April 28, Musk and OpenAI executives faced off in a federal court in Oakland, California. (See: Musk vs. Altman: The Biggest Case in AI History Goes to Trial)

This man, bearing the title of the world's richest person, was a co-founder of OpenAI, only to walk away in frustration like Steve Jobs before him. As opening statements and court exhibits were released on May 6 and 7, more unknown details involving two trillion-dollar tech giants, SpaceX and OpenAI, gradually came to light. This includes both Musk's own maneuvers and the personal motives and public principles of OpenAI's executives.

Odaily Planet Daily has compiled eight stories based on public information and court documents to offer readers a glimpse into the hidden circumstances behind this "biggest AI trial in history," involving a potential settlement of up to $134 billion.

Inside Story 1: Musk Pumped in $38 Million in Seed Funding; OpenAI Exec Greg Brockman "Earns" $30 Billion in Equity

During the second week of the Musk v. OpenAI trial, OpenAI co-founder and President Greg Brockman, along with his personal diaries from 2015 to 2023, appeared as a witness and evidence. Musk's lawyer, Steven Molo, quickly seized on a "weakness": compared to Musk's $38 million in hard cash to support OpenAI's founding and early development, Brockman admitted he "didn't invest a single penny" in OpenAI's creation and growth. Yet today, based on OpenAI's post-funding valuation of $825 billion, his personal equity in the company is worth approximately $30 billion.

Brockman's diary also laid bare his "financial ambitions," featuring entries like:

• "Financially, what will take me to $1B?"; "It would be nice to be making the billions." / "We've been thinking that maybe we should just flip to a for profit. Making the money for us sounds great and all."
• "Can't see us turning this into a for-profit without a very nasty fight... It'd be wrong to steal the non-profit from him. That'd be pretty morally bankrupt... and he's really not an idiot. His story will correctly be that we weren't honest with him in the end about still wanting to do the for-profit just without him."
• More strikingly, he wrote, "This is our only chance to get rid of Musk...Making me $1 billion."

Although Brockman argued that some of this was hypothetical scenarios assuming the board had ousted Musk, it hardly paints a picture of someone indifferent to wealth.

The context matters because Brockman had previously promised to donate $100,000 to the OpenAI non-profit foundation, a promise never fulfilled. When asked, "Do you want to fund the non-profit, or do you want to become a billionaire off OpenAI?" he magnanimously replied, "Having $10 billion in stock would be satisfying enough," but was left speechless when Molo asked why he didn't donate his remaining $29 billion in equity to the non-profit foundation.

For comparison, Brockman invested $471 million in his former employer, Stripe, and holds shares in cloud provider CoreWeave, one of OpenAI's partners. The co-founder who came in on technical know-how suddenly became the center of heated public debate for wanting to have it both ways.

Inside Story 2: Former OpenAI Board Member Met Musk at a Company Retreat, Then Accepted Sperm Donation and Had Four Children

On May 7 Beijing time, former OpenAI board member Shivon Zilis, who has four children with Musk, also testified in court.

According to her, she first met Musk at an OpenAI company retreat. She joined OpenAI in 2016 and served as a board member for several years.

After she decided to become a single mother and have children, Musk, who has long championed a "human-centric" mission, proactively offered to donate sperm for her to have children via IVF.

Regarding their current relationship status, Zilis stated, "We are in a romantic relationship, and Musk visits regularly." However, she denied being Musk's "secret agent" or "source of information." Musk, for his part, referred to her as a "close advisor."

After Musk's relationship with other OpenAI co-founders soured in 2018, she still acted as a bridge for communication. She only formally left the OpenAI board after Musk founded xAI, a competitor to OpenAI, in 2023.

Inside Story 3: OpenAI Was Originally Called the "AI Manhattan Project"; Musk Personally Chose the Current Name

In May 2015, Sam Altman, then president of Y Combinator, sent Musk an email proposing that YC lead a "Manhattan Project-style AI lab." (Odaily Planet Daily note: A reference to the atomic bomb project led by Oppenheimer.)

Ultimately, Musk personally named this new AI lab the "Open AI Institute," abbreviated as "OpenAI" (inspired by the "Open Source" concept) — a name that itself embodies the core philosophy of OpenAI's founding: openness, transparency, and serving all of humanity.

Looking back now at the development path of AGI and their ironic courtroom showdown, Sam Altman might have foreseen that OpenAI and large AI models would, like the atomic bomb, transform from a hoped-for "tool to end wars" into a "weapon of mass destruction capable of destroying the world." OpenAI's complete transformation into a for-profit entity planning an IPO also signals its departure from its original spirit of openness and open-source.

Inside Story 4: Musk Poached Former Google Researcher Ilya Sutskever for OpenAI with a Single Phone Call

In 2015, Ilya Sutskever, who had been acquired by Google, suddenly received a "cold email" from Sam Altman (Odaily Planet Daily note: A personal email sent to someone with no prior interaction), inviting him to dinner with Greg Brockman and Musk to discuss forming a new AI research organization (which became OpenAI). Altman emphasized the organization's goal was to develop AGI for the benefit of all humanity, preventing monopoly by a few giant companies.

At the time, Sutskever had worked at Google for nearly three years and was highly valued and strongly urged to stay by the Google Brain team and DeepMind founder Demis Hassabis.

Despite being aligned with the philosophy, Sutskever hesitated to accept the "Chief Scientist" offer from this unproven "upstart." Ultimately, Musk called him on the very day of OpenAI's public launch, persuading him to jump ship, bringing a foundational figure to OpenAI's early development.

Unfortunately, in November 2023, Ilya Sutskever, as a board member, participated in the decision to "oust Sam Altman as CEO" due to differences over AI safety vs. commercial development. The saga ended with Altman regaining control of the board, Ilya publicly apologizing and resigning. He formally left OpenAI in May 2024, with Altman publicly acknowledging, "Without Ilya, there would be no OpenAI today."

Inside Story 5: OpenAI Almost Became a Tesla Subsidiary; OpenAI Employees Once Worked for Tesla for Free

These two pieces of information come from the aforementioned former board member Shivon Zilis and co-founder Greg Brockman.

According to Zilis, around 2017, about two years after OpenAI's founding, Musk, Altman, and others were struggling with computing power and funding, constantly looking for capital and GPU resources.

One day, Musk suddenly proposed merging OpenAI into Tesla, making it a subsidiary and operating as an internal AI lab to secure more funding and resources. Musk also prepared a Tesla board seat for Altman. Of course, due to strong opposition from Altman and Brockman, this plan never materialized. It was shortly after this that Musk began to diverge from OpenAI's founding team, culminating in a complete breakdown in 2018 and his angry departure.

Furthermore, according to Brockman, Musk had pulled several OpenAI employees, including former OpenAI researcher and now one of the "AI titans" Andrej Karpathy, to work for free on Tesla's autonomous driving team.

Inside Story 6: Musk Tried to "Bribe" Greg Brockman and Ilya Sutskever with Founder Series Tesla Model 3s

In July 2017, on the eve of the "haunted mansion meeting" regarding control of OpenAI's majority equity, Musk emailed some OpenAI executives, explicitly stating: "As a token of my thanks for your contributions to OpenAI, I'd like to give each of you a Founder Series Model 3. These are among the first produced and are not yet available to the public."

In August 2017, Sutskever texted Brockman about this: "At least we're getting our Teslas." "Will a Model 3 make you be willing to accept massively unfavourable terms?" At that time, OpenAI's core leadership was already prepared for Musk's "sugar-coated bullets."

Brockman also stated in court that the "Tesla car reward" wasn't for hard work but to give Musk greater influence within OpenAI, a way to curry favor with him and Sutskever (Odaily Planet Daily note: arguably a form of bribery). The cars were delivered in late August 2017, perfectly timed right before the meeting about equity distribution for the for-profit entity.

Interestingly, as a goodwill gesture, then-Chief Scientist Ilya Sutskever commissioned a painting of a Tesla Model 3 and presented it to Musk at the subsequent "haunted mansion meeting."

Inside Story 7: At the Haunted Mansion Meeting, Musk Suddenly Lost His Temper, Almost "Hitting Someone"

In August 2017, after OpenAI beat top human players in a Dota 2 tournament, Musk proposed a "celebration," inviting the team to a party at his newly purchased 47-acre, $23 million mansion in Hillsborough, California.

Due to the outdated decor, poor maintenance, and eerie atmosphere (like a Gatsby-esque odd mansion), Musk jokingly called it the "haunted mansion," even emailing a warning beforehand that guests might "see party carnage."

According to Brockman's courtroom testimony, besides the OpenAI team, Musk's then-girlfriend Amber Heard was initially present, pouring whiskey before leaving with friends. The atmosphere was pleasant at first. However, when the discussion turned to the "next steps" for transitioning OpenAI into a for-profit entity, things took a turn. When Musk didn't get the response he wanted regarding equity distribution and control, he seemed to change personality, "suddenly stood up, stormed around the table, and was very angry." Brockman stated plainly: "I really thought he was going to hit me."

Finally, Musk grabbed the painting Sutskever had given him, announced he would cut off funding for OpenAI unless Brockman and Sutskever resigned, and stormed out of the room, ending the party in disarray.

Inside Story 8: Musk "Endured Humiliation" to Gain Control of OpenAI, Only to Fulfill His "Mars Dream"?

In court, when asked, "Why did Musk absolutely need to gain control of OpenAI?", Greg Brockman replied that Musk had told him the reason was: He needed $80 billion to fulfill his grand vision of building a city on Mars.

Meanwhile, SpaceX's IPO was being actively prepared, with a target fundraising amount of approximately $75 billion, close to the $80 billion Brockman mentioned.

Eight years later, the root cause of the love-hate relationship between Musk and OpenAI may finally be clear: Musk needed OpenAI to be a crucial vessel for funding SpaceX. If he had successfully gained control back then, he might have, like Altman and Brockman, transformed OpenAI into a for-profit entity. The difference is, Musk might not have then redundantly started xAI from scratch, eventually planning to merge it into SpaceX.

Of course, according to the latest news, Musk has turned to collaborating with OpenAI's biggest rival, Anthropic, betting his existing computing resources on them as a roundabout way to achieve his ultimate dream—landing on Mars. See "Musk and Anthropic: Looking for Electricity in Space".

We conclude this article with a small courtroom anecdote from this "first major case in the AI field," involving a potential claim of up to $134 billion.

According to documents filed by OpenAI's lawyers, two days before the trial formally began, Musk texted Greg Brockman to sound out OpenAI's willingness to settle. When Brockman suggested "both sides should drop their claims," Musk retorted sharply: "This weekend, you and Sam will be the most hated people in America. If you insist, so be it."

Although the presiding judge, Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, ultimately did not accept this text message as evidence, the current situation suggests that the "legal war" between Musk and OpenAI is far from over.