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Musk's new lawsuit against OpenAI argues Microsoft contract is invalid if AGI is reached

Matthias Bastian
Matthias Bastian View the LinkedIn Profile of Matthias Bastian
Aug 6, 2024
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Midjourney prompted by THE DECODER

Update –

  • Musk is at it again.

Update August 6, 2024:

Elon Musk has filed a new lawsuit against OpenAI and two of its founders, Sam Altman and Greg Brockman, in a federal court in Northern California.

Musk again accuses OpenAI of violating its founding agreement by prioritizing commercial interests over the public good. According to the lawsuit, Altman and Brockman had promised to freely share their technologies but instead granted Microsoft an exclusive license. The original complaint described OpenAI as a "closed-source subsidiary" of Microsoft.

The lawsuit now argues that OpenAI's contract with Microsoft should become invalid once the lab achieves Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). The court is asked to determine whether OpenAI's latest systems have already reached AGI. The scientific and industry consensus is that OpenAI has not yet achieved such a system.

Musk's lawyer Marc Toberoff told the New York Times that the new lawsuit is "more forceful" than the previous one, which Musk withdrew without explanation after seven weeks (see below).

Original article from June 12, 2024:

Elon Musk drops lawsuit against OpenAI

Elon Musk has withdrawn his lawsuit against OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman, accusing the startup of abandoning its original mission of developing AI for the benefit of humanity rather than for profit.

According to court documents, Musk requested that the lawsuit, which was filed in February, be dismissed without explanation. On X, Musk says he will share more details later. In the lawsuit, Musk demanded that OpenAI should be forced to make its research and technology available to the public.

OpenAI argues that the lawsuit is based on incoherent allegations and is a contrived attempt by Musk to advance his own AI interests. Musk has his own AI startup, xAI, which competes with OpenAI.

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