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Inside the Courtroom Circus With Elon Musk and Sam Altman
- Thread starter philb2
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Inside the Courtroom Circus With Elon Musk and Sam Altman
The tech leaders, with combined net worths exceeding $670 billion, have brought props to court and traded icy stares as their legal dispute reaches a denouement.Credit...Illustration by Alice Lagarde; Photographs by Brennan Smart for The New York Times, Jason Henry for The New York Times, Getty Images
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By Mike Isaac
Reporting from the Ronald V. Dellums courthouse in Oakland, Calif.
- May 11, 2026
Most of what we see of Elon Musk and Sam Altman, two of Silicon Valley’s most powerful men, comes in the form of carefully curated personas.
Mr. Musk, who prefers to dress entirely in black, associates himself with rockets, home-brewed flamethrowers and even a .50-caliber sniper rifle. Mr. Altman aims for elder statesman vibes, posing for portraits as a kind of heir to Steve Jobs. Tech billionaires, it turns out, care about how the public sees them.
But a rancorous lawsuit between the two has provided a different glimpse of them. For the past two weeks, I’ve spent hours on the fourth floor of the Ronald V. Dellums federal courthouse in Oakland, Calif., loitering in wait for Mr. Musk and Mr. Altman as they face off in a backbiting trial over the artificial intelligence company they co-founded, OpenAI.
Mr. Musk’s lawsuit against Mr. Altman is important, with billions of dollars and the future of the A.I. industry at stake. But the case matters for another reason: It has given an up-close-and-personal look at how two men worth more than a combined $670 billion function under extreme pressure.
Mr. Musk, 54, appeared to have brought a squeezable stress ball along with him, clutching it while fidgeting during his testimony. Mr. Altman, 41, occasionally locked eyes with others while walking from the private witness area to the courtroom. (Mr. Musk has tended to stare at the floor.) And OpenAI’s president, Greg Brockman, 38, was surprisingly tall in person and almost always accompanied by his wife, Anna.
Think of the trial this way: It was like seeing the Wizard of Oz after Dorothy’s cairn terrier, Toto, reveals him.
“The traditional way tech executives operate is to insulate themselves from being perceived as ordinary people by building huge armies of minders, public relations staff and organizational processes to create a wholly manufactured image,” said Dex Hunter-Torricke, the founder of the Center for Tomorrow, a nonprofit addressing societal issues that could arise from A.I. “The moment you have the opportunity to pull back the curtain, Wizard of Oz style, shows how these people really are just human beings.”
In his 2024 lawsuit, Mr. Musk accused OpenAI of taking advantage of his money and breaching its founding agreement to be a nonprofit that gave priority to the public good over commercial interests. OpenAI has claimed the lawsuit is frivolous and intended to slow the company while Mr. Musk builds a competitor. If found liable, OpenAI could be on the hook for $150 billion.
When the trial began the week of April 27, it seemed as if the circus had arrived. Outside the courthouse, a member of Stop AI, a protest group, held an oversize cardboard cutout of Mr. Musk in a bathing suit. It was not designed to be flattering.
Another group brought an inflatable “tube man” — the kind seen outside struggling car dealerships — with the words “Elon Sucks” in white lettering. One woman took a more egalitarian stance with her handwritten sign: “Musk v Altman: Everyone sucks here.”
Anti-artificial intelligence protests outside the Ronald V. Dellums federal courthouse in Oakland, Calif. Credit...Jason Henry for The New York Times
Not everyone was a hater. I spoke with some local college students who had rushed to the courthouse for a reverent glimpse of Mr. Musk. The court made 30 unreserved seats inside the courtroom available each day, and those hoping to secure one needed to arrive well before the building opened at 7 a.m. or risk being shunted to an overflow room.
One woman dressed in black spent each morning in the building courtyard snapping selfies while taking puffs from a vape pen. She tried taking a photo of Mr. Musk in the courthouse hallway, only to be caught by U.S. marshals and then scolded by the judge, Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, for breaking the rules against recording in the building. The marshal made the woman delete her photos.
Other attendees were clearly there for entertainment. An older gentleman in the gallery once took his shoes off before eating a packed lunch. A marshal eventually whispered to him, “You’re not in your living room.”
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Mr. Musk and Mr. Altman persuaded the court to let them enter the building through the garage, bypassing hoi polloi pressed against the glass of the front door. Not all of the tech elite were afforded the same courtesy; Mr. Brockman walked through the main entrance, as did Shivon Zilis, a former OpenAI board member and the mother of four of Mr. Musk’s children.
The tech titans were mostly on good behavior and in their good clothes. (Mr. Musk in a black suit, with Mr. Altman and Mr. Brockman in gentler blues.) Mr. Musk and Mr. Altman did not interact with each other much, except for occasionally trading icy stares.
During his testimony, Mr. Musk portrayed himself to the nine-person jury as a bold entrepreneur whose primary concern was the survival of the human race. “We want a Gene Roddenberry outcome like ‘Star Trek,’” he said about how to responsibly develop A.I. “Not so much a James Cameron movie like ‘Terminator.’”
At other times, Mr. Musk grew visibly frustrated with William Savitt, OpenAI’s lawyer. Mr. Musk, who at one point called himself an “extremely literal person,” said Mr. Savitt’s questions were “misleading” and “designed to trick him.” When Mr. Musk snapped back with a sarcastic response, a few younger men in the gallery chuckled and seemed to quietly cheer on the sass.
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Mr. Musk arriving at federal courthouse in Oakland. He has portrayed himself to the jury as a bold entrepreneur whose primary concern is the survival of the human race.Credit...Jason Henry for The New York Times
Mr. Altman, who has yet to testify, was more toned down. He spent the trial’s first three days in the gallery’s front row, next to Mr. Brockman and Joshua Achiam, whose mandate at OpenAI is to care about A.I. safety. (It was probably no accident that in a trial discussing A.I.’s potential dangers, Mr. Achiam was seated front and center.)
During Mr. Musk’s testimony, Mr. Brockman scribbled pages of notes in red pen on a legal pad, a journaling habit he said he picked up 16 years ago. Paradoxically, his early career journals were being used against him as evidence in the trial, which, Mr. Brockman said at the trial, was “very painful” for him.
Mr. Altman often stared straight ahead and sometimes shifted in his seat, perhaps made uncomfortable by Mr. Musk’s uncharitable view of OpenAI or from seven hours of sitting on the unforgiving hardwood of a courtroom bench.
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Mr. Altman is set to testify at the trial this week.Credit...Brennan Smart for The New York Times
Some of Mr. Musk’s allies came prepared. Ari Emanuel, the Hollywood superagent and chief executive of WME Group, who is a Musk confidant, showed up as part of Mr. Musk’s entourage, accompanied by a bodyguard who carried a green Harrods bag containing two plush, cream-colored pillows. (The protesters’ cardboard cutout photo of Mr. Musk? It was snapped by paparazzi a few years earlier when the billionaire summered with Mr. Emanuel on a superyacht off the Greek island of Mykonos.)
Mr. Emanuel, who flew in from Los Angeles for the trial, was dressed in the type of blue windbreaker that billionaires wear to the annual Allen & Company technology and media conference in Sun Valley, Idaho. He was chatty with reporters in the hallway between breaks in testimony. Not with me, however; Mr. Emanuel thrice ignored my overtures to talk about the case.
Most witnesses did not appear thrilled to be there. Under cross-examination by OpenAI’s lawyers, Ms. Zilis gave terse responses, adding the occasional sarcastic aside. Mira Murati, OpenAI’s former chief technology officer, did not attend at all; the week her video deposition played in court, she was across the country in Manhattan for the Met Gala.
(The New York Times has sued OpenAI and Microsoft, claiming copyright infringement of news content related to A.I. systems. The two companies have denied the claims.)
Ari Emanuel, the Hollywood superagent and chief executive of WME Group, top, and Shivon Zilis, a former OpenAI board member and the mother of four of Mr. Musk’s children, arriving at the courthouse.Credit...Jason Henry for The New York Times, Brennan Smart for The New York Times
With roughly a week of testimony left before jury deliberations, the carnival outside the courthouse has quieted. The audience lines have shortened, the protest balloons deflated.
But there is still more to be revealed. Mr. Altman and Microsoft’s chief executive, Satya Nadella, are expected to testify this week. And last Wednesday, lawyers released a trove of text messages among OpenAI executives during one of the company’s most chaotic periods, when Mr. Altman was briefly fired by the board in 2023.
At the time, OpenAI leaders put on brave public faces. But the texts revealed what happened in private. In one exchange between Mr. Altman and Ms. Murati, who would later describe trying to stabilize the company as it faced a potential implosion, he peppered her with questions about his chances of survival as OpenAI’s chief executive.
“Sam this is very bad,” she wrote.
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can we ban paywall articles?
DukenukemX
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Should anyone care if two billions are fighting each other in the most childish way?
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Or you could just not click on it and stfu?
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sharknice
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I thought the new Dirty Mountain Dew would be disgusting but it's actually extremely good.
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Did I miss something? I managed to click the link and read the article yesterday on my phone while taking the train home. Hmmm upon further looking, it's paywalled on my computer for some reason, ad blocker too aggressive?
Either way, the level of fan boying going between these two sure is something, like up there Steve Jobs level almost. Although, wouldn't surprise me if these people are just employees of said companies.
Either way, the level of fan boying going between these two sure is something, like up there Steve Jobs level almost. Although, wouldn't surprise me if these people are just employees of said companies.
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The truth is, no one can come up with a legitimate reason why they hate Elon, all they do is repeat the same propaganda they hear from the media. Its really ridiculous.
On topic, its not surprising that people like Altman want to exploit the bejesus out of AI and it seems that this is going against their original agreement.
DukenukemX
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Oh good, now I can read the article.
The title of the article said circus so I expected clowns. It did not disappoint.
I'm not even sure what the lawsuit is about? Sam Altman didn't prioritize profits over safety? Does seem like a frivolous lawsuit.
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OpenAI had a governing agreement (or something like that), this lawsuit alleges that they did not or are not holding to that agreement. I forget the exact details, but it's something to do with the "Open" in "OpenAI."
DukenukemX
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So is Elon Musk's lawsuit legit or we're watching Elon try to beat the already dead OpenAI horse?
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IANAL, but it seemed to have some merit when I read about it a few months ago. Whether it holds weight will depend on what they bring to court, I guess.
sharknice
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The opposite. It's basically about them being founded as a non-profit and then Sam turning it into a for profit company.
What is so dead about OpenAI? More like xAI is (almost) dead
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None of them are dying anytime soon.
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DukenukemX
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Haha! That's golden (meant in friendly context).
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M76
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The truth or you just dismiss any criticism as hate? Maybe in 2014 your stance would come across as milquetoast when all his questionable conduct was not common knowledge, but today you are part of a very small ever dwindling group who still idolizes him.
You are trying to frame criticism of him as irrational by calling it hate. Criticism is not hate. Whether the critic hates him or not has no bearing on the legitimacy of the criticism.
- He gained his initial wealth by coming from a rich family, and then getting fired from the predecessor of paypal gaining a golden parachute - not through any merit.
- He did not create Tesla, he bought his way in, later forcing out the original founders, then took all credit (some still believe to this day that ha built tesla from the grounds up, or worse he invented the electric car)
- The initial success of Tesla is in-spite of him not because of him, the model S was already planned out when he ousted the original creators, and the projects he is fully in charge of were either complete vaporware, empty promises, huge flops, or outright nonsense.
- He constantly over promises and under delivers hyping up the investor market, which in many expert opinions is borderline fraudulent behavior. Full self driving since 2012, roadster "we're making it now" since 2017.
I don't hate Musk, I think he did a legitimately good thing for free speech by buying twitter. And he did make SpaceX which did do well, until he started peddling delusions there too. Don't get me wrong, I'd love the fireworks show of starship if it wasn't NASA money he is blowing up. Which in case you forget spaceX got awarded the artemis contract through NASA director Kathy Lueders' sole decision during covid, who then quit NASA and went to work for SpaceX.
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M76
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Depends on what do you mean by dying. OpenAI can't make good on its own datacenter investment commitments. While xAI is already renting out their existing capacity because using it themselves is burning money.
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“OpenAI Trial Wraps Up With 'Jackass' Trophy For Challenging MuskAnonymous Coward 5 hours ago | 0 |
| After three weeks of testimony, the Musk v. Altman trial is nearing its end. OpenAI has rested its case, closing arguments are set for Thursday, and jury deliberations are expected to begin afterward. An anonymous reader quotes a report from Business Insider: Joshua Achiam, OpenAI's chief futurist, was probably the most memorable witness of the day. He told jurors about a companywide meeting where Musk answered questions about his planned departure from OpenAI in 2018. Musk told the crowd of 50 or 60 people that he was leaving OpenAI to start his own competing AI. He said he wanted to "build it very fast, because he was very worried that someone else, if they got it, would do the wrong thing with it," Achiam said. Achaim said he challenged Musk on the safety of this approach, which he called "unsafe and reckless." "How did Musk respond," OpenAI's lawyer Randall Jackson asked. "Defensively," Achiam said. "We had a pretty tense exchange, and he snapped and called me a jackass." In an effort to prove Achiam's story, OpenAI's lawyers brought a trophy to court that the futurist said he received after his heated exchange with Musk. On the witness stand, Achiam described the trophy as "a small golden jackass, inscribed with: 'never stop being a jackass for safety.'" He said his then-colleagues, Dario Amodei and David Luan, gave it to him as a thank-you for standing up to the Tesla CEO. Lead OpenAI attorney William Savitt told reporters after the day's session that Wednesday had been the first time he'd touched the statue. The futurist had to do without the visual aid, however. Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers did not accept the trophy as evidence, so it did not appear before the jury. Musk and Altman have presented dueling experts on a question at the core of the trial -- was the nonprofit that runs OpenAI hurt or helped by its $13 billion partnership with Microsoft? Musk's expert testified last week that the partnership was indeed hurt, supporting the Tesla CEO's contention that in partnering with Microsoft, OpenAI betrayed the company's nonprofit origins and mission. But on Thursday, OpenAI's expert, John Coates, used Musk's expert's own pie chart and testimony against him. The partnership has "generated value for the nonprofit that I believe he himself accepted was in the $200 billion range in his own testimony," Coates said, referencing Musk expert Daniel Schizer. "If that's not faring well, I don't know what faring well is." In a scored point for Musk, the jury learned Thursday that Microsoft's own CTO once raised concerns about how OpenAI's early nonprofit donors, including LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman, would react to a partnership. "I wonder if the big OpenAI donors are aware of these plans," Chief Technology Officer Kevin Scott said in a 2018 email he was asked to read aloud to jurors. In it, Scott said he doubted donors would appreciate OpenAI using their seed money to "go build a for-profit thing." Scott was being questioned by an OpenAI lawyer, who may have wanted jurors to quickly hear Scott's explanation: that he only had a "vague awareness" of what was happening at OpenAI at the time. Scott also told the jury he wasn't thinking about Musk when he made the remark. "Primarily, I was thinking about Reid Hoffman. He was the OpenAI donor I knew," Scott said, adding, "I wasn't thinking about anyone besides him."Recap: Sam Altman Testifies That Elon Musk Wanted Control of OpenAI (Day Ten) Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella Testifies In OpenAI Trial(Day Nine) Sam Altman Had a Bad Day In Court (Day Eight) Sam Altman's Management Style Comes Under the Microscope At OpenAI Trial (Day Seven) Brockman Rebuts Musk's Take On Startup's History, Recounts Secret Work For Tesla (Day Six) OpenAI President Discloses His Stake In the Company Is Worth $30 Billion (Day Five) Musk Concludes Testimony At OpenAI Trial (Day Four) Elon Musk Says OpenAI Betrayed Him, Clashes With Company's Attorney (Day Three) Musk Testifies OpenAI Was Created As Nonprofit To Counter Google (Day Two) Elon Musk and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman Head To Court(Day One)” |
Except Elon was ok with that as long as he was in charge. So ultimately it is a power struggle. Elon wanted control ... then wanted to wrap it into Tesla. When all that failed he's now resorting to a lawsuit.
sharknice
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I haven't seen any evidence of that. Sounds like redditor seething to me.
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Its cases like this that makes me glad I got out of jury duty that I would have had to do in 2 weeks. The idea of "civic responsibility" really goes ouy the window in cases like this
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I don't think juries generally make decisions in civil cases like this. Since it's an agreement, it should be a pretty cut and dry case, likely with established case law.
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wonder why they couldn’t of settled out of court for this one, Hmm
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They could have, and it would probably involve less money. But if he really cares about the agreement, he may want the court involved for more than just the monetary damages.wonder why they couldn’t of settled out of court for this one, Hmm
Edit: would also require both parties to come to an agreement on settlement terms, which may be difficult.
Juries settle matters of fact. The job of the jury is to rule on the facts of the case.
Judges settle matters of law. That is to enforce the law where the facts are not in dispute.
The parties cannot agree on the facts, thus a neutral arbiter (usually a jury, but can be a judge if parties agree to wave a jury trial) will determine the facts before the judge steps in to enforce the (contract) law.
Judges settle matters of law. That is to enforce the law where the facts are not in dispute.
The parties cannot agree on the facts, thus a neutral arbiter (usually a jury, but can be a judge if parties agree to wave a jury trial) will determine the facts before the judge steps in to enforce the (contract) law.
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It's a case where neither side is particularly appealing, and a win for either won't really help everyday people.
I just wish we'd stop the hero worship of Elon Musk, like M76 suggested. Whatever you think of his personal life, he's just not a good corporate leader. He promises products and features that are either delayed for years or never come to fruiition; SpaceX risks becoming more of a hindrance than a help for NASA; he's trying to pivot to AI and robots when the tech isn't ready yet; and of course, there's siding with a government that wants to destroy his main business.
It's like watching Steve Jobs' redemption arc in reverse.
I just wish we'd stop the hero worship of Elon Musk, like M76 suggested. Whatever you think of his personal life, he's just not a good corporate leader. He promises products and features that are either delayed for years or never come to fruiition; SpaceX risks becoming more of a hindrance than a help for NASA; he's trying to pivot to AI and robots when the tech isn't ready yet; and of course, there's siding with a government that wants to destroy his main business.
It's like watching Steve Jobs' redemption arc in reverse.
DukenukemX
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How many here can make the claim that Elon is their daddy? Does that make me Elon's 13th child?Haha! That's golden (meant in friendly context).
Remember when Elon made it so you could see where people are posting from? Good stuff.
That's the problem with criticism in that it can and often does get confused as hate. As far as I'm concerned, Elon is just theater. Who challenges someone to a duel in Elden Ring PVP?
View: https://youtu.be/41alfw7EI38?si=Alak2DfuD4YdOokE
Elon likes to put on a show. It's kinda his thing. He doesn't care about the money as much as putting people in their place.wonder why they couldn’t of settled out of court for this one, Hmm
If Elon was your daddy you would probably be a genetically superior hybrid that is rich so there's worse things to be lmao.
So what exactly is this case about?
His name does have X in it so Elon may actually be his daddy.
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I have. He blatantly asked to roll OpenAI into Tesla. Did you not read the coverage of the trial?
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A jury was absolutely picked for this case, jury duty is not just for matters of criminal intent.
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I said "not generally", not "never." And Sindalis already corrected me, thank you.