Elon Musk, one of the initial investors in OpenAI, makers of ChatGPT, has sued the company, its CEO Sam Altman and others for abandoning its original mission of developing artificial intelligence for the benefit of humanity.
Musk filed the lawsuit late on Thursday, saying Altman and co-founder Greg Brockman originally approached him to fund an open-source, non-profit company.
In a filing issued to a San Francisco court, Musk’s lawyers wrote: “OpenAI has been transformed into a closed-source de facto subsidiary of the largest technology company in the world – Microsoft. Under its new board, it is not just developing but is refining an AGI to maximise profits for Microsoft, rather than for the benefit of humanity.”
Musk co-founded OpenAI in 2015, but stepped down from its board in 2018.
Microsoft, which is said to have poured $13 billion in OpenAI, was not named as a defendant in the suit.
Musk claims include breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty and unfair business practices against OpenAI and he has asked for the company to revert back to open source. He has also asked for an injunction against Altman, Brockman and Microsoft from profiting off of the company’s AI technology.
In the filing, Musk pointed out to the case of GPT-4, which was released in March 2023 but remains a closed model, “a move driven by commercial considerations rather than in the interest of humanity” and adding they have kept the design of GPT-4 “a complete secret”.
“The internal details of GPT-4 are known only to OpenAI and, on information and belief, to Microsoft. GPT-4 is hence the opposite of ‘open AI’,” Musk says in the suit. “And it is closed for propriety commercial reasons: Microsoft stands to make a fortune selling GPT-4 to the public, which would not be possible if OpenAI—as it is required to do—makes the technology freely available to the public.
“Contrary to the Founding Agreement, the defendants have chosen to use GPT-4 not for the benefit of humanity, but as proprietary technology to maximise profits for literally the largest company in the world.”
ChatGPT, the chatbot from OpenAI, became the fastest-growing software application in the world within six months of its launch in November 2022. It also sparked the launch of rival chatbots from Microsoft, Alphabet and a bevy of startups that tapped the hype to secure billions in funding.
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