On Thursday, Elon Musk filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, co-founders Sam Altman and Gregory Brockman, and other executives, accusing the artificial intelligence company he helped launch of putting profits over the future of humanity by partnering with Microsoft, thereby abandoning its founding mission.
Musk accused the defendants of breaching their contract and engaging in unfair business practices. He called on them to make good on their original commitment to keep things open source, and requested an injunction to prevent OpenAI and Microsoft from profiting off the innovations. The company set out originally to a non-profit enterprise.
"OpenAI, Inc. has been transformed into a closed-source de facto subsidiary of the largest technology company in the world: Microsoft," Musk lamented in the suit, which was filed in San Francisco Superior Court. "Under its new board, it is not just developing but is actually refining an AGI to maximize profits for Microsoft, rather than for the benefit of humanity."
Musk explained that at OpenAI's founding in 2015, it was agreed upon that it would "serve as a vital counterbalance to, Google/DeepMind in the race for AGI, but would do so to benefit humanity, not the shareholders of a private, for-profit company."
