‘He is a bully and someone who likes to …’ Sam Altman on why Elon Musk has ‘issues’ with OpenAI

Sam Altman, Elon Musk

It’s no secret that there’s no love lost between OpenAI and Elon Musk. Musk, who was one of the early investors in OpenAI, left the startup in 2019. Altman and Musk co-founded OpenAI with the vision of advancing AI technology for the benefit of humanity. However, their partnership soured when Musk left the company, citing disagreements over its direction and governance. Musk has since been a vocal critic of OpenAI, filing lawsuits and accusing the organisation of deceiving him during its founding.

Sam Altman, CEO, of OpenAI, was recently asked about his equation with Musk and why the Tesla CEO has issues with OpenAI. “I don’t live inside Elon’s head, so this is a little bit of a speculation,” Altman said in an interview with Barry Weiss podcast. Altman said that Musk “did a lot to help OpenAI in the early days,” and in spite of all this, “I’m very grateful”. Altman also called Musk a “sort of legendary entrepreneur.”

However, Altman said that Musk is clearly a bully, and he’s also someone who clearly likes to get in fights. “Right now, it’s me. It’s been Bezos, Gates, Zuckerberg, lots of other people,” said Altman.

According to Altman, it fundamentally stems down to OpenAI doing really well. “Elon cares about doing really well. Elon started, and now runs, a very direct competitor that’s trying to do exactly what OpenAI does.”

One of Musk's primary grievances is OpenAI's transition to a for-profit model, which he opposed. Despite this, emails released by OpenAI suggest that Musk had initially supported such a structure. Altman believes that Musk's hostility stems from OpenAI's success and his lack of control over the company. "Everything we're doing, I believe Elon would be happy about if he were in control of OpenAI," Altman remarked.