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Elon Musk sues Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and OpenAI [pdf]

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Re: Elon Musk sues Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and OpenAI [pdf]

#661

Post by Spivak »

troupe wrote: post #625
99_00 wrote: post #549

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the charter legally binding? Is it unchangeable? A single quote doesn't tell us much.

Going to the IRS and saying, "This is how we plan to benefit humanity and because of that, we shouldn't have to pay income tax." and then coming back later and saying, "We decided to do the opposite of what we said." is likely to create some problems.

Right, and when they decide to do the opposite they lose the tax benefit, I'm not really sure there's an argument that says they can't change their designation.

Re: Elon Musk sues Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and OpenAI [pdf]

#662

Post by gamblor956 »

troupe wrote: post #438

If OpenAI became a non-profit with this in its charter: “resulting technology will benefit the public and the corporation will seek to open source technology for the public benefit when applicable. The corporation is not organized for the private gain of any person" I don't think it is going to be hard to show that they are doing something very different than what they said they were going to do.

From the Articles of Incorporation:

"The specific purpose of this corporation is to provide funding for research, development and distribution of technology related to artificial intelligence. The resulting technology will benefit the public and the corporation will seek to open source technology for the public benefit when applicable."

Based on this, it would be extremely hard to show that they are doing something very different from what they said they were going to do, namely, fund the research and development of AI technology. They state that the technology developed will benefit the public, not that it will belong to the public, except "when applicable."

It's not illegal for a non-profit to have a for-profit subsidiary earning income; many non-profits earn a substantial portion of their annual revenue from for-profit activities. The for-profit subsidiary/activity is subject to income tax. That income then goes to the non-profit parent can be used to fund the non-profit mission...which it appears they are. It would only be a private benefit issue if the directors or employees of the non-profit were to receive an "excess benefit" from the non-profit (generally, meaning salary and benefits or other remuneration in excess of what is appropriate based on the market).

Re: Elon Musk sues Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and OpenAI [pdf]

#663

Post by chasd00 »

archagon wrote: post #633
reducesuffering wrote: post #629

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A powerful technology is a danger to society if only a few people possess it. By giving it to everyone, you even the playing field. That's why we all have personal nukes, of course. Very safe

I shudder at a world where only corporations had nukes.

nuclear weapons is a ridiculous comparison and only furthers the gas lighting of society. At the barest of bare minimums, AI might, possibly, theoretically, perhaps pose a threat to established power structures (like any disruptive technology does). However, a nuclear weapon definitely destroys physical objects within its effective range. Relating the two is ridiculous.

Re: Elon Musk sues Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and OpenAI [pdf]

#664

Post by viraptor »

anotherhue wrote: post #617
aleksandrh wrote: post #610

> Indeed, as the November 2023 drama was unfolding, Microsoft’s CEO boasted that it would not matter “[i]f OpenAI disappeared tomorrow.” He explained that “[w]e have all the IP rights and all the capability.” “We have the people, we have the compute, we have the data, we have everything.” “We are below them, above them, around them.” Yikes. This technology definitely needs to be open source, especially if we get to t…

> A powerful technology is a danger to society if only a few people possess it. By giving it to everyone, you even the playing field. Except nukes. Only allies can have nukes.

Is that really the case? Nukes are supposed to be deterrents. If only groups aligned with each other have nukes that sounds more dangerous than enemies having nukes and knowing they can't use them.

Re: Elon Musk sues Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and OpenAI [pdf]

#665

Post by boringg »

qwertox wrote: post #658

Whatever his reason may be (like resentment for jumping off the ship too soon and missing out, or standing in for humanity), I like what I read in the sense that it contains all the stuff that needs to be spoken about publicly, and the court seems to be the optimal place for this. It feels like Microsoft is misusing the partnership only to block other companies from having access to the IP. They said they don't need…

I don't think he has any resentment about jumping off "too soon" as you say. He specifically abandoned ship because he didn't align with the organization anymore. I suspect this has been a long time coming given his public commentary on AI.

He's goal on OpenAI investments were to keep close watch on the development of AI. If you believe the public comments or not is an entirely different matter though I do feel like there is sincerity in Elons AI comments.

Re: Elon Musk sues Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and OpenAI [pdf]

#666

Post by bitcurious »

riku_iki wrote: post #489
Kranar wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The statement of claims is full of damages. It claims that Musk donated 44 million dollars on the basis of specific claims made by the plaintiffs as well as the leasing of office space and some other contributions Musk made.

it sounds like small amount in grand scheme of things..

Unless you consider it as funding in a seed round. These days, OpenAI is worth double digit billions at the very least. If Musk funded the venture as a startup, he’d have increased his net worth by at least a few billion.

Re: Elon Musk sues Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and OpenAI [pdf]

#667

Post by mywittyname »

patcon wrote: post #598
nicce wrote: post #588

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the tech really is dangerous then being more closed arguably is in the public's best interest, and this is certainly the reason OpenAI have previously given. Not really. It slows down like security over obscurity. It needs to be open that we know the real risks and we have the best information to combat it. Otherwise, someone who does the same in closed matter, has better chances to get advantage when misusing i…

When I try to port your logic over into nuclear capacity it doesn't hold very well. Nuclear capacity is constrained, and those constraining it attempt to do so for reasons public good (energy, warfare, peace). You could argue about effectiveness, but our failure to self-annihilate seems positive testament to the strategy. Transparency does not serve us when mitigating certain forms of danger. I'm trying to remain hum…

The difference between nuclear capability and AI capability is that you can't just rent out nuclear enrichment facilities on a per-hour basis, nor can you buy the components to build such facilities at a local store. But you can train AI models by renting AWS servers or building your own.

If one could just walk into a store and buy plutonium, then society would probably take a much different approach to nuclear security.

Re: Elon Musk sues Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and OpenAI [pdf]

#668

Post by samstave »

troupe wrote: post #438

If OpenAI became a non-profit with this in its charter: “resulting technology will benefit the public and the corporation will seek to open source technology for the public benefit when applicable. The corporation is not organized for the private gain of any person" I don't think it is going to be hard to show that they are doing something very different than what they said they were going to do.

[dead]

Re: Elon Musk sues Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and OpenAI [pdf]

#669

Post by vineyardmike »

qwertox wrote: post #658

Whatever his reason may be (like resentment for jumping off the ship too soon and missing out, or standing in for humanity), I like what I read in the sense that it contains all the stuff that needs to be spoken about publicly, and the court seems to be the optimal place for this. It feels like Microsoft is misusing the partnership only to block other companies from having access to the IP. They said they don't need…

> Not seeing Mistral Large as an open source model now has a bitter taste to it.

A company needs a product to sell. If they give away everything, they have nothing to sell. This was surely always the plan.

(1) They can give away the model but sell an API - but they can’t serve a model as cheap as Goog/Msft/Amzn who have better unit economics on their cloud and better pricing on GPUs (plus custom inference chips).

(2) they can sell the model. In which case they can’t give it away for free. Unlike open source code, there probably isn’t a market for support and similar “upsells” yet.

Re: Elon Musk sues Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and OpenAI [pdf]

#670

Post by Aloisius »

troupe wrote: post #438

If OpenAI became a non-profit with this in its charter: “resulting technology will benefit the public and the corporation will seek to open source technology for the public benefit when applicable. The corporation is not organized for the private gain of any person" I don't think it is going to be hard to show that they are doing something very different than what they said they were going to do.

Let's say for the sake of argument that they violated their original charter, it still wouldn't give Musk standing to bring the suit.

The charter is not a contract with Musk. He has no more standing than you or I.

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