The court battle between the titans of artificial intelligence, Elon Musk and Sam Altman, always threatened to create a circus atmosphere, and after day one, it didn’t disappoint.
And if protesters outside wearing Stop AI T-shirts and a judge chastising the billionaires for pre-trial social media jousting wasn’t enough, Musk’s warning of a Terminator scenario for the world under AI really set the scene.
Musk is playing up his role as AI’s – and indeed humanity’s – safety guard against a technology that he declared in court “could kill us all”. The billionaire tech titan was the first to testify in the case as his lawyers opened proceedings.
The courtroom drama promises to be one in which hyperbole is dialled up to maximum.
But wait a minute, isn’t Musk’s track record on AI safety open to dispute? Earlier this year, the city of Baltimore became the first in a line of lawsuits against Musk’s xAI company which allege its Grok chatbot generated non-consensual sexualised images and child pornography.
This self-proclaimed free speech absolutist set about upending Twitter’s moderation policies when he acquired the company (now X) back in 2022.
‘We don’t want to have a Terminator outcome. We want to be in a Gene Roddenberry outcome, like Star Trek. Not so much a James Cameron movie like Terminator.’
Elon Musk
Musk’s apocalyptic threats and altruistic claims should also be read against the backdrop of his own plans to turbocharge his AI ambitions to list xAI with a valuation of $US1.25 trillion ($1.75 trillion).
He is also looking to extract $US134 billion in damages. Previously, he sought the damages for himself, but has now asked for all “ill-gotten gains” to go to the Open AI charity.
Musk is already the world’s richest man who last year negotiated with the Tesla board to receive a pay deal with potential to earn $US1 trillion.
If one peels away back the emotive claims, this legal brawl is about money and control of the lucrative AI ecosystem.
Musk’s lawyers kicked off court proceedings with the high-octane accusation that Altman “stole a charity”.
Altman’s legal attack dogs accused Musk of engaging in a harassment campaign and of being motivated by jealousy, regret for walking away, and desire to wound his competition.
The legal dispute which has been brought by Musk alleges that his Open AI co-founders Altman and president Greg Brockman went back on their promises to keep the company a non-profit organisation.
After a falling-out in 2018, Musk left the business, which has since grown to a $US852 billion company which is planning a public listing as early as this year.
Musk is arguing that Altman and Brockman profited illegally: “They enriched themselves, they made themselves more powerful, and they breached the very basic principles on which the charity was founded,” Musk’s lawyer, Steve Molo, declared in opening remarks.
Musk is being characterised by his lawyers as humanity’s saviour from the real potential harms of AI, and that his motivation for founding Open AI as a non-profit was that it was his gift to the human race.
“We don’t want to have a Terminator outcome. We want to be in a Gene Roddenberry outcome, like Star Trek. Not so much a James Cameron movie like Terminator,” Musk said.
On the other hand, he depicts Altman as motivated by avarice.
Musk highlighted his fears about AI which he said were fed at a 2015 meeting with Google co-founder Larry Page. Musk worried that Page’s prediction that this technology would usher in Utopia ignored its extreme risks.
Musk boasted that Page had branded him a “specieist” who prioritised the survival of humanity over artificial intelligence.
For anyone fearful of a dystopian world in which machines will conquer humanity, this is a case to avoid.
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