Before opening statements in the trial between Elon Musk and OpenAI began on Tuesday, the world’s richest man was already speaking out on X, the social media platform he owns.
Mr. Musk went on the offensive, writing more than twenty times on Monday about OpenAI; its CEO, Sam Altman; and court. Mr. Musk, who was one of the founders of OpenAI but left in 2018, told his nearly 240 million followers the story that he helped create an artificial intelligence lab to save humanity, but that OpenAI lost its way after becoming a for-profit company.
“Fraud Altman and Greg Stockman stole charity,” Mr. Musk wrote at one point, using sharp nicknames for Mr. Altman and Greg Brockman, the president of OpenAI. “Greg got tens of billions of shares for himself and Scam dozens of side deals with OpenAI with a piece of the action for himself.”
(The New York Times sued OpenAI and its partner, Microsoft, accusing them of infringing news content related to AI systems. OpenAI and Microsoft have denied the claims.)
Mr. Musk has long used the platform formerly known as Twitter to shape public opinion on presidential elections, global politics and other issues. In March, he went public with another trial at X, a case in which he was accused of defrauding investors when he bought Twitter in 2022. Mr. Musk tried to contest the case, but a jury ultimately found him partially responsible for investors’ losses in the deal.
His posts on X are unlikely to influence the jury in his trial against OpenAI, as jurors are usually instructed to stay away from news and social media. But that has rarely stopped Mr Musk from drumming up conversations at X that reinforce his point of view.
“The main difference between Elon Musk and Sam Altman: Elon Musk is actually changing the world for the better and saving lives,” read one post Mr Musk reposted on Monday. “Sam Altman? Mostly he just takes.”
Some X users reported seeing a weeks-old post on their timelines containing a New Yorker article critical of Mr. Altman on Monday. X had marked According to some users, the post was “boosted” by Mr Musk’s account, suggesting the tech billionaire may have promoted the post. Mr. Musk has made a number of changes to X to further his interests, including slowing or limiting access to certain news outlets and competing platforms and banning certain reporters.
Mr. Musk and a representative of X did not respond to requests for comment. OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
On Tuesday, Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers of the US District Court for the Northern District of California, who is presiding over the case, called Mr. Musk to the dock to discuss whether there should be a gag order preventing him from posting information about the trial on social media.
“How can we do this without you making it worse outside the courtroom?” she asked.
After Mr. Musk said he was just responding to things OpenAI said online, the judge asked him — and Mr. Altman and Mr. Brockman — to start with a “clean slate” and “keep things to a minimum” on social media. Everyone agreed.
Cade Metz contributed reporting.
