Because no one has commented yet on the legal significance:
Musk lost today because the jury found that he waited too long to bring his claims. The jury answers only yes/no questions, so we do not know their exact thoughts, but it is likely they determined that the 2019 and 2021 Microsoft deals were too similar to the 2023 Microsoft deal that was the centerpiece of Musk’s lawsuit. Musk could have brought the same lawsuit in 2019 or 2021, meaning his claims were untimely for the 3 year statute of limitations.
Because the statute of limitations is a precondition, the jury was not asked to find any other facts. They may tell the press what they thought on other issues, or they may not.
The judge was prepared to immediately accept the jury’s finding, and said she agreed that the jury’s decision was supported by the evidence.
It is possible for Musk to appeal, but success is vanishingly unlikely. Whether Musk’s claims are barred by the statute of limitations is a quintessential question of fact, and appellate courts are extraordinarily deferential to factual findings by juries so as a practical matter it’s almost impossible to appeal this verdict.
My own thoughts:
If I had been on the jury, I would have found against Musk on every point.
His lawyers created a “3 phases of doubt” to try and sidestep the statute of limitations, but it was clearly bogus and he was on notice of OpenAI creating a for-profit in 2019.
Musk was perfectly happy to have OpenAI be a for-profit, a non-profit with an attached for-profit (the current structure), or even just absorbed into Tesla. His complaints fell flat for me given the number of emails where he said that a non-profit was likely a mistake.
This is technical, but Musk clearly never created a charitable trust, which was a precondition for his claims. His funds were donated for general use by OpenAI, not for any specific use that would allow him to claim breach of charitable trust. Also, all of his funds were spent by no later than 2020 which is before his alleged breach in 2023.
Musk unreasonably delayed bringing this case until the success of ChatGPT and starting a competing AI company, and he had unclean hands because he attempted to sabotage OpenAI repeatedly by poaching its key staff while on the board.
Musk should have just made another company and then he’d have another 500 billion but he had that mistake and now it’s over. Then again we’ll see how well open ai does over the long term
Evidence at trial showed that Musk attempted to pursue AGI at Tesla starting in 2017 before he left the board of OpenAI. He was unsuccessful in that endeavor and later restarted his efforts in xAI after the success of ChatGPT.
Musk leaves the board in 2018 I think. And something happens in DX-754 where they've pivoted to AI in SpaceX around then too. I had a lot of trouble telling what "AI" meant in late 2017 at Tesla.
---
Sept 1, 2017 DX-669: Funding paused confirmation. Elon is still on the board for a while. DX-707 specifies the board as of Sept 26, 2017, and even suggests adding Shivon, Jared, Sam Teller.
Jan 31, 2018 DX-748: Elon is still discussing things with Greg. Elon: "The only paths I can think of are a major expansion of OpenAI and a major expansion of Tesla AI. Perhaps both simultaneously"
Feb 3, 2018 DX-754: Sam Teller says Elon "just suggested we use SpaceX email for AI stuff so switching over to that"
Feb 4, 2018 DX-755: Sam Teller and Shivon Zilis discuss disabling Openai
Feb 20, 2018 DX-770: Elon officially leaves board (first document I see specifying)
This is not about money for him, this was always about control. When they wouldn't give him complete control over the project, he pulled out and probably expected OAI to fold without his support. But they survived, and he eventually realised that he had made a huge mistake by giving up all of his influence over SOTA AI research.
I sometimes wonder, what does one need a second 500 billion that the first 500 billion is not enough for?
Interestingly, during the trial he promised to donate any potential financial winnings to OpenAI's charity.
A move that surprisingly didn't get much press.
I think you are referring to a tweet on March 16th where he said "Btw, the proceeds of any legal victory in the OpenAI case will be donated to charity. I will in no way enrich myself." Not during the trial, not a donation to OpenAI's charity, and obviously not meaningful given his track record of not following through on public statements.
It was official, he amended the lawsuit to codify it, read it for yourself: https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/Musk-...
Thanks, couldn't find this. This is essentially a proposal to the court about how the case could be resolved though, not a promise, and he only proposed it after the judge denied his original proposal (https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/Musk-...), which was "give me $134 billion". I think it would have been a little more credible if he had requested this originally.
Even taking it at face value, it's just an idea for the judge to consider, not legally binding for anybody.
Putting it into a filing does not necessarily make it legally binding. I asked ChatGPT and (although it is clearly in the bag for OpenAI ;) it gave more color: https://chatgpt.com/share/6a0baf4a-e408-83ea-a44b-ff68bacb64...
I genuinely don't know how to make a non-sarcastic statement about Mr. Elon Musk's promises.
I especially struggle to not make a Venn diagram of people who still take Mr. Musk's promises seriously, and current state of American politics.
I simply cannot make a sentence about Mr. Musks promises that will pass Hacker News guidelines of being serious and productive.
...And that's how I feel about Mr. Musks promises, particularly those regarding donations and charities. I think the only way that promise by Mr Musk could've been made stronger, is if it were a Twitter poll :).
You’ve written around the existence of pronouns with impressive determination.
Each buck we spend is a vote for a business (which is a bag of ideals and methods) It is surprising that people apparently desire a future where they don't even have to bother listening to those in charge as every word is completely irrelevant. I had considered they don't understand capitalism is quite open to influence but they also do it in elections.
Elon Musk promises a lot of things that never come to fruition.
Have we colonized Mars yet? Asking for a friend.
I don't understand this thinking at all.
I share all the disillusionment and cynicism about Musk, shared here by others.
But he has also done amazing things. When someone declares they are going to create a Martian colony, something literally "out of this world", and against all odds makes unbelievable progress for years, including re-usable rockets that return and land vertically, more efficient powerful engines, and fast operational turnarounds, while making orbital travel mundane, hanging a criticism of schedules on the weak hook of "yet" is myopic.
People don’t look at the complexity of a human character. They take the easiest extreme and run with it. I was on another HN thread where practically everyone was calling Elon a psychopath.
If you think objectively Elon is not a psychopath.
As a straight answer (for 'one') I'm sure we could think a dozen projects that would ameliorate suffering for countless people before breakfast without trying. However I appreciate that's not your point.
Getting to Mars, it would seem.
I agree we'd all be better off if SpaceX figured out how to send Musk to Mars ASAP.
Does anyone seriously still believe this? I thought as a society we had realized Musk is simply BSing whatever he feels like until it becomes untenable.
Oh, you mean like:
Solar Roof: https://electrek.co/2026/05/14/tesla-solar-roof-promise-vs-r...
Tesla Full Self Driving: https://electrek.co/2026/05/18/musk-unsupervised-fsd-widespr...
Hyperloop / Boring Company mass-transit vision
Mars settlement timelines
X as an everything app
I mean, most of his wealth is coming from his overhyping skill, you can also tell marketing. Or lying.
I consider him a visionary in a sense of innovation but he is insecure and immoral one.
Needles to say his investors made money on his over promises.
Does Elon over-hype nearly everything he gets involved with? Clearly yes.
Does he also deliver on some mind-boggling timelines? Well Tesla went from delivering its first cars in 2008 to having the best selling car in the world in 2023, and SpaceX went from not having successfully launched a rocket to delivering about 80% of the world's space payload in roughly the same timeframe. So I'd say that's clearly a 'yes', too.
> Does anyone seriously still believe this?
I do. It’s not his singular focus. But he continues to personally invest himself in pushing the boundaries of human spacefaring capability. That goal seems more meaningful to him that it does to e.g. Bezos, who seems to have a rocket company to look cool.
He slashed tons of basic science funding under DOGE.
At one point he was probably sincere but he's been consumed by culture war slop.
See: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48186106
Yeah, but slashing basic science funding isn't a "yes, and", it's more of a "no, but". It goes directly against trying to get to mars.
It’s in his own biography (the older one) that spacex would pursue mars without distraction. That he went to great lengths to ensure it wouldn’t be used for military, tourism, etc.
You can’t believe musk without simultaneously believing he’s a liar. It’s in HIS fucking book.
> It’s in his own biography (the older one) that spacex would pursue mars without distraction. That he went to great lengths to ensure it wouldn’t be used for military, tourism, etc.
I said I believe he wants to go to Mars and will put in the work to make that happen. I didn't say everything he's said is true. Musk absolutely lies. But his actions speak pretty consistently to Mars being a real goal.
I know there's a risk when Musk's name comes up that everyone takes "all against" or "all for" approach - very polarising figure.
But I see a lot of that announcement, and the others someone else pointed to as his "aspirational, but ultimately never going to happen" goals - whether he believes the claims are achievable, or not, he says these things to energise people to working/paying for him to try
It costs him little to nothing to say, and other people's time, effort, and capital to try (and succeed/fail)
Tesla is falling to pieces now, and SpaceX is getting loaded up with completely unrelated projects (xAI) in order to try and make it look saleable (I guess) - it's very difficult to see the Mars announcement as anything but hype.
> It costs him little to nothing to say,
That all depends on how much he values his credibility, I think..
But to be fair, for someone as good at self promotion as he is, I can believe that the value of the hype could be greater than the cost in credibility.
Tesla is falling to pieces?
https://stocks.apple.com/symbol/TSLA
> Tesla is falling to pieces now
Did I miss something?
Year over year sales are declining. Stratospheric stock price is propped up by promise of selling humanoid robots, a technology (and market) which are unproven.
I would not invest.
That's a no, it's business as usual except they have massive cash reserves.
Having approximately $44 billion in cash on hand is not a massive cash reserve for any company with the market cap of Tesla ($1.3 trillion). Even less so when you realize how capital intensive its current car and non-existent robot business is… The entire EV market is risky right now for margin compression as Chinese EV manufacturers are really pulling ahead. It’s pretty wild to see just how far they’ve progressed while the west mostly does nothing. Even Tesla hasn’t provided any real innovation in years in regards to their core business. And from what I can tell, they’re pretty much outright ignoring their auxiliary businesses.
If Optimus fails to impress, and gain traction, I’d seriously expect Tesla to end up a subsidiary of SpaceX within the next ten years as Elon tries to protect up his net worth.
That's why I think the Optimus thing might make sense from a 'market cap' perspective. Tesla is great at innovation and ramping global manufacturing for new tech. Ten years ago, that was EVs. But now EVs are becoming a commodity and every other car company is catching up.
I do think 'self driving' is still their 'moat' when it comes to EVs. I use it every day, and nothing else comes close. But other than that, building EVs is becoming a cut-throat slim-margin business. I don't think that's where Elon, or Tesla employees, want to spend their energy.
> It’s pretty wild to see just how far they’ve progressed while the west mostly does nothing.
The “west” came up with Tesla and Rivian, and their cars are on the road. And the US tariffed chinese EVs. What else can be done to combat China’s lower priced labor and possibly more lax environmental regulations?
> difficult to see the Mars announcement as anything but hype
Oh yeah, the announcement is hype. But there is actual work underneath it making real progress in science and engineering that moves us closer to Mars. Some of that, moreover, is work that has limited appeal outside a Martian context.
What a load of crap. He pushes this narrative purely for valuation purposes.
He has a legion of people propping up his stock by manipulating them into believing he is a wizard.
This is a joint project of U.S. government military planners and an ostensible private individual. If Elon disappeared, rest assured, the contracts and development would still happen.
They want mega constellations for always-on drone guidance and for "golden dome" which would allow for the laser-based shoot-down of long range exo-atmospheric missiles. You need reusable spacecraft to make that tenable. This is not about Mars, don't buy the marketing. At best for civilians, this is about making broadband widely available such that America can dominate internet connectivity going forward and increase spying further. As an example, examine a map of Starlink connectivity, you will notice that Russia and Gaza are excluded.
The Artemis missions will eventually enable the placement of communications equipment on the moon, making anti-satellite weapons less effective at disrupting critical communications.
Fortress America will be invincible forever, so so they desire. The macroeconomics are not working out for them though even though the technological edge is still working for them on that level.
> They want mega constellations for always-on drone guidance and for "golden dome" which would allow for the laser-based shoot-down of long range exo-atmospheric missiles
This is a conspiracy theory folks who just Googled In-Q-Tel have been stringing together since Covid. It's not true.
> examine a map of Starlink connectivity, you will notice that Russia and Gaza are excluded
Russia wasn't excluded until recently. That was a problem!
> The Artemis missions will eventually enable the placement of communications equipment on the moon, making anti-satellite weapons less effective at disrupting critical communications
Wat.
> This is a conspiracy theory folks who just Googled In-Q-Tel have been stringing together since Covid. It's not true.
??? It's documented that Ukraine is using Starlink extensively.
Golden dome: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/golden-dome-for-america-trump-m...
> Wat.
Communications are an exception to the lunar treaty that governs the militarization of space.
Don't forget that the original space program was designed to peacefully demonstrate a high degree of control over ICBM class rockets. They're so good and accurate, we can put a human on top of one. The government does not spend huge amounts of money on things like "art" or "science" without a motivating factor. This is the capitalist empire, not socialism.
> pushing the boundaries of human spacefaring capability
I guess polluting space with shitty satellites and causing environmental disasters with failed and questionably-permitted rocket launches is, technically, pushing on boundaries of human spacefaring capability.
> guess polluting space with shitty satellites and causing environmental disasters with failed and questionably-permitted rocket launches is, technically, pushing on boundaries of human spacefaring capability
My cat is both cute and fluffy as well as a menace.
I mean, I really dislike what Musk has become but SpaceX has brought about a huge leap in access to space. Last year they launched more than the rest of the world combined, including the rest of the US. They now own more operating satellites than the rest of the world combined. When the rest of the Western world's launchers have had problems over the last few years (Ariane, Vulcan, EU Soyuz, New Glenn, Antares) SpaceX has been able to absorb their payloads with relative ease rather than waiting many years for other arrangements. They've saved the US many $Bs in launch costs by undercutting the incumbent monopoly. Cheaply and easily reusing a rocket was thought impossible, now it's routine and every rocket maker on earth is attempting to copy them.
If you look at their filings, they are now pivoting into an "AI company". (Meaning, that's where the majority of their future value is described as coming from.) It's possible that this is a harmless investor swindle and they'll keep relentlessly innovating. But you should probably be worried.
Musk is like that person on Facebook you know that is really good at <welding / programming / performing surgeries / etc> then they post about their thoughts on some other topic and all you can respond with is “stay in your lane.”
Musk has been successful is pure engineering efforts led by engineers he hired achieving the next big-but-not-too-big step.
You ignore his thoughts on everything else.
I genuinely believe he wants to go to Mars. Desperately.
He's fundamentally a very smart socially inept largely sociopathic emotionally immature obsessively driven boy who read a lot of Heinlein as a kid. Everything about him indicates he sees himself as a saviour of humanity and the only person who has their priorities right and everybody should appreciate and adore him and it's so darn frustrating when they don't, oh wait this other party will adore me, now they don't anymore either oh HUMbug.
Do I believe any of his promises? No absolutely not. But I do think Mars is his massive obsession and that he fervently (If completely Implausibly) believes it'll work and help humanity.
Because he is an addict and one of his addictions is money
Maybe he trying to collect every waifu from every gacha game. That would get expensive in a hurry.
Every <unit of currency> not in your pocket is in someone else’s. Greedy narcissists can’t stand that, they need to have it all. They don’t need the extra 500 billion to spend it, they need it so the number goes up. They need to be number one. At everything. Remember when Musk lied about being one of the top players for some difficult video game, then it turned out he was paying someone else to play for him? It’s just an ego thing, which I agree is baffling.
Yeah, but lets practice some empathy.
Starting point: money can't buy happiness.
So what to do to be happy? Extreme wealth removes most practical goals like buying things or going places and doing things. Not that you can't do them, but it's not a meaningful goal to work towards.
They have to create their own meaning, whatever that is.
A billionaire trying to create purpose for themselves can be boring, or weird. Which one gets media coverage?
Gates Foundation, Zukerberg's fitness craze, MacKenzie Scott's philanthropy, Bezos and Musk's [whateverness] are all just variations on a theme. And like all people, some will be better at it than others.
Note though, that they will do what it takes to stay wealthy because what would they be without that?
Greedy narcissists are lacking in empathy, that’s what makes them greedy narcissists.
That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be empathetic, of course. Someone else’s lack of empathy does not excuse our own. However, consider that billionaires mostly reach that status by exploiting others. Musk, Bezos, Zuckerberg, they all fit that mould. Being empathetic does not mean being a chump. I’m not going to shed a tear for the poor exploitative billionaire who underpays and overworks people to the point they literally die on the floor of their warehouses and others around them are ordered to keep working.
If given the choice to defend the one billionaire who is fucking up the world and billions of lives in the process, or those who are being exploited by said billionaire, I think it’s obvious where one should place their empathy.
It’s not my responsibility, or yours, or anyone but themselves, that they can’t find meaning in life without being massive assholes. Use some of that money to go to therapy. Use it to enhance the lives of others around you, improve your community and you improve your own well being. It’s not that hard, we’ve known for a long time that a way to happiness is to do things for others.
Musk himself has lamented that money does not buy happiness, and after that expressed the desire to become the first trillionaire. I mean, come on…
I wasn't trying to say all billionaires deserve an outpouring of defence for their actions. Merely that their actions are as human as the rest of us, just in a different context.
And like the rest of us, there are those who cope better or worse, who are morally better or worse. Police are another bunch of people judged similarly.
Which is to say, there are indeed woeful billionaires. Possibly most of them. But don't paint the humans all with the same brush, even if the way to fix society might be to do so legally.
[flagged]
Fool here. What’s the small bit of research I need to do?
To build more cool stuff. Would be great if he did neurolink for cancer
Because money is just a proxy for power, and the goal is not to have cash, it is to have power. Perhaps via being able to make decisions at various businesses, or being able to travel to a different planet, or being able to influence other people, etc.
Could also partly be a curiosity to see what one is capable of, or maybe wanting to be known for helming an organization that accomplishes xyz.
Why did he need a second 250 billion after the first 250 billion? Makes me think of a inverted Zeno's paradox.
Why do you need an extra dollar?
I can answer for myself: New Zealand plans to tax the shit out of anyone that has more[A].
You need a fukton more than median wealth to be able to protect yourself against your own government.
The type of person that enjoys chasing money doesn't stop.
[A] via capital gains taxes and wealth taxes. Also one needs an excessive amount more to handle progressive taxation and means testing.
I want extra money so I can pay for simple things like food and pay my mortgage and send my kid to a school, and help family members out.
Realistically I probably need $5m and I'd be set for life.
If I had $10m instead of $5m I don't see how my life would meaningfully change.
That's the difference between builders and consumers. People who are mostly consumers have a realistic number where they could stop contributing to society. Smalltime builders can imagine a lot of wealth, but at a certain point don't want to get too big. Big Dreamers are only limited by what they can imagine and make happen, and only infinite capital, labor, and time could achieve their dreams. Once you surround yourself with people dreaming of humans as multiplanetary, earthly levels of labor and wealth are obviously not going to make it happen.
Hmm... I think I could be set for life with, like, $1m.
Obviously age, family, lifestyle and current savings matter.
As long as all the basics are paid for house, car, know how to cook maybe have a small garden and no other debt you probably can.
I used to think that. A simple home. Plus a basic middle class income - to cover necessities and a some extra disposableincome. I figured 1 million for a home and 1 million for investments. Nothing too flash, just cover the basics.
The National NZ median house price is about NZD800k, and the Christchurch average estimated value is about NZD800k. That's about how much I spent in a less desirable suburb (Brighton). And I will have to downsize when I reach 65 because otherwise progressive council taxes (rates) and insurance will drawdown my savings too quickly.
We don't have social security in New Zealand: the government takes our taxes and has paid past retirees superannuation (NZD500 per week). But I'm unlikely to receive that: our government must renege on the expectation because the demographics are unaffordable (tweaking multiple constraints to fuck me - e.g. introducing means testing so that if you save you lose).
In theory we could grow our economy. But our government doesn't understand how to create economic growth via good incentives. I know that because my personal incentives are totally out of economic whack (I'm the perfect demographic for a second startup). I have acquaintances who are living in cars, and their incentives are also completely fucked.
You simply can't look at what your retirees do now and make any projection based on that: governments have to pull the rug on you.
House prices depend on the next generation signing up for ever bigger mortgages (such that their interest payments eat the majority of their income). When the music stops, homeowner's expectations will be screwed.
In New Zealand we prop up our economy using immigrants: but that is an unsustainable engine.
New Zealand is increasing taxes faster than investments accrue. We have a 5% wealth tax on owning overseas shares worth more than NZD50000 in total. Investment gains are taxed at 30% or more - e.g. dividends or investment funds.
We currently have a partial CGT on property, and the CGT will take more and more of property gains (perhaps a good thing to discourage property investors?).
In the past in Christchurch residential property generally stayed ahead of inflation by about 1.5%–3% per year in real terms. A CGT of ~30% could easily make that return nothing. That's the norm in New Zealand: work hard, take risks, get no reward. Need luck.
Individually the taxes (and costs such as insurance) appear reasonable, but they screw any hope of using compounding to maintain a reasonable drawdown. A 4% drawdown could absolutely fuck you if you have the bad luck to live a little longer. See https://paulgraham.com/wtax.html
Getting taxed at an unsustainable rate is probably unavoidable without radically changing one's life or taking extreme risks. I had thought 1 million savings would be enough with compounding, but it is clear our government wants to take a massive bite of any investment gains such that you have wasted time and effort, and your investment risks may have no gains.
We have socialised healthcare, but I think we are heading towards the same reality as the US where you likely have to make yourself broke before getting any help (and the help will be more constrained).
The current retirees get financial and healthcare benefits that I will never ever get. Even though many retirees live on extremely meagre means.
It doesn't matter how much I give to the NZ economy: I believe my politicians when they propose measures to take my rewards from me. I use my engineering to be realistic. I'm not yet a hardened cynic (although perhaps I'm slowly being trained to believe that world view).
I understand the economics of my country better than most.
Most people don't want to see reality. Most people look at what current retirees get, and then assume they will get the same... We aren't being lied to. It is just collectively we all hope too much and trust too much.
> I can answer for myself: New Zealand plans to tax the shit out of anyone that has more[A].
New Zeeland is an outlier in that it doesn't have capital gains tax.
Its not the end of the world to have captial gains tax.
CGT is fine.
I wasn't trolling, but I have unfortunately deviated from the topic.
What isn't fine is my belief that I'm going to be rug-pulled by my government. From multiple sources I believe New Zealand will tax most savings to smithereens. The lie is that I should save for retirement; when any savings will be taken from me over time via a variety of mechanisms including taxes.
Both our Labour (leftish) and National parties will screw me.
The underlying issue is that our demographics leave little choice to the government. The majority of voters are naturally happy to take everything from everyone who has more than them. Voters are selfish.
Attacking the successful is called the tall-poppy syndrome down here. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tall_poppy_syndrome (I'm nowhere near successful enough for much backlash - but I do fear it).
I was trying to make a argument based on marginal economics. NZ should be encouraging me to increase my income from export earnings: instead it drastically discourages me. I helped found a startup, so I deeply understand the multiple ways our government discourages us from earning export income. My marginal utility from an extra dollar is already drastically diminished because I already have enough to enjoy my life. The >40% taxation on top (incl GST) reduces my motivation to earn money for NZ to nearly zero. I am not a money chaser and I dislike investing.
After some threshold, money as a marginal value becomes meaningless because other non-monetary factors like politics dominate. It seems like nobody cares how much society profits from you - they only care about their own selfish goals.
It’s also not the end of the world to not have capital gains tax.
"Why did he need a second 250 billion after the first 250 billion"
because thats another 250 billion less for a competitor to use against you.
That is zero-sum thinking.
I'm not sure how one can learn to see the world in a more positive light...
I'd argue that if we don't abstract away resource usage behind currency, we are pretty firmly in negative-sum territory and zero-sum is a pretty rose colored glasses way of looking at things that is currently obscuring us from pending horrors.
These people aren't satisfied with themselves having more, everyone else must have less too.
Not that I am interested in changing your mind on this. I would, though, encourage you to actually say it's "positive-sum" if that's what you believe instead of hinting and then being vague about it for some reason.
Why did you turn that into a whine about a tax that exists in 31 of 38 OECD economies?
Go to Australia where you pay a stamp duty for buying (to pay for infra) and a CGT for selling
Edit: Changed stamp tax to stamp duty
Yeah, no, this is bullshit.
You can't just apply One Simple Rule like this ("more money is always better" / "more money never makes a difference"). There is, objectively, an amount of money above which another dollar, or another billion, will never make a meaningful difference in your overall lifestyle[0].
The amount isn't a single bright line, but like with so many things, there's an area below it where extra money unquestionably improves your quality of life, and an area above it where it unquestionably doesn't.
[0] unless "your lifestyle" involves manipulating major governments and controlling the way people the world over think, which I wouldn't consider a legitimate part of "lifestyle"
> Why did he need a second 250 billion after the first 250 billion?
Because billionaires are mentally unwell.
I think this is missing the main point that Musk was never the owner of OpenAI, neither was Sam, nor the employees. The owners are the American people. I presume Musk got a tax rebate from his donation, courtesy of the taxpayer; so did every other donor.
The fact is, OpenAI was a non-profit belonging to the public and it was appropriated by the donors... Who already got their tax cuts.
This is setting a precedent that if you donate a certain amount of money to a charity, you can later convert it to a for-profit and claim to be an owner of the charity... On the basis of 'donations' which you got a tax rebate from. Very convenient.
OpenAI donors should have created a new, separate, for-profit entity completely distinct from OpenAI, with a different name, poached the original employees, implemented all the logic from scratch, collected all the training data from scratch... This would have been correct. Basically what Anthropic did seems more like the correct way.
OpenAI Foundation is a corporation established in Delaware. It has received it's 501(c)3 status from the IRS which means donations are deductible to the fullest extent of the law (or some such; it's been a long time since I've had to write that). The American people do not own the foundation.
As for the OpenAI that is a public benefits corporation, I know nothing about all the ins and outs of that type of corporation.
I don't understand your reasoning here. You seem to be suggesting that non-profits are owned by the American people?
Is there some part of this that I'm missing where this was true of OpenAI at some point?
I'm using the term 'owners' loosely here, but this is a much more reasonable interpretation than the interpretation that the donors are the owners.
I don't think you understand how non-profits work. Essentially they are exactly the same as for-profits, except they can't issue dividends. Ownership works exactly the same as for-profit companies.
A cynical take is that non-profits are for-salary; they still pay their owners, just using other means.
edit: no, my bad, apparently I misunderstood how non-profits work in the USA. Thanks for the correction :)
This is not correct. jongjong is correct that a nonprofit does not have owners in the sense that a for-profit has owners. Nonprofits are dedicated to their mission, and are run by a board of directors.
You cannot have a % ownership in a nonprofit because its resources must be used exclusively to carry out its mission. You could have a % control in its decision making process.
They're correct about the equity ownership bit, but not in their argument that there's an implicit public claim of control.
The intellectual property (code, data) was transferred from the nonprofit to the for-profit for about $60M, which is what an independent firm hired to assess the value said the IP was worth in late 2018 / early 2019. The nonprofit itself was never converted to a for-profit, and indeed remains a nonprofit to this day.
The $60M in IP has grown to about a $200B stake in the OpenAI for-profit.
I'm unfamiliar with the US legal system but do they really need a jury and a trial to determine whether the claims are barred by the statute of limitations? Couldn't this be decided by a judge before trial?
Part of the Statute of Limitations isn't just on when he filed the claim, but when he found out or should have found out, by reasonable diligence that he had a claim at all.
So the question before the jury has a significant component of "Should he have found out by this time?" Which is a question of fact, and facts are typically decided by juries, in the US at least.
The two parties can agree together to let a judge decide facts like this, but generally, if one or the other party wants it to go to a jury, it does.
I'm guessing part of Musk's strategy was to have it go to the jury, which are often seen as easier to manipulate than judges, especially when a case is weak. Or perhaps his team already knew this particular judge would be inclined to rule against him, so did the next best thing.
Also, it's worth pointing out that the jury was obviously correct. Musk was lying his ass off. There is no possible way to imagine that Elon Musk, the hyper-online dude obsessed with news, AI, and AI news, would not be aware of the well-publicized events of a company he was personally massively invested in.
Elon argued that even though the events in question took place sometime between 2017 and 2020 OpenAI intentionally hid the information from him until 2022-2023 which is why he wasn't able to file the lawsuit until 2024.
That's what the jury found against - they said he was reasonably informed enough to have brought the suit earlier and thus the 3 year clock should start ticking in 2020 not 2023.
In the US, judges make determinations of law, but juries (in a jury trial at least) must evaluate the evidence to make findings of fact. So the jury would need to make a finding as to when the statute of limitations started ticking based on the evidence, and the judge then makes the legal determination that the statutory period has lapsed.
In the American system juries figure out questions of fact and judges figure out questions of law.
In this case I guess the question was 'when did the incident actually happen' with Elon arguing it was later then Altman.
Bit late, but since I don’t see any correct answers here - no a jury is not required here. The judge chose to convene an *advisory* jury here — likely to strengthen the factual findings of the court and maybe to save the court itself some time/effort.
In the US (I believe all common law systems), the jury is the trier of fact. If there is a genuine factual dispute between the two parties in a lawsuit, then that dispute is resolved by a jury (unless the parties opt-out).
Statutes of limitations are usually not tried by juries because the underlying facts that cause them to kick in are usually not in actual dispute. Instead a fight over statute of limitation is more likely to be over which statute applies or whether some other mitigating circumstance is kicking in, which are matters of law which do not go to a jury.
In this case the judge determined that it did require a trial and refused to dismiss based on statute of limitations.
If it’s a very clear fact yes a judge can make the call. In this case what Musk knew was part of that and a jury then had to make the call on what the fact was.
That's like saying can't the Judge decide who the killer was when he literally saw the video of shooting.
Or like if a piece of evidence was obtained lawfully?
I can understand why people and me included might think they can decide this before trial.
These days, video evidence can be called into doubt pretty easily
One still need to decide:
- if the video is real (not AI / edited / another event)
- if the subject the same person (twins, look alike, too bury to tell)
etc
It’s quite an odd ruling given that OpenAI completed its for profit “conversion” last fall.
It seems the biggest value loss to the nonprofit was in this conversion, not in the initial for profit subsidiary creation giving investors capped profit shares.
But this "conversion" was apparently not the focus of the suit, according to OP. Perhaps it occurred after they initiated legal proceedings?
Correct, Musk based his claims on the 2023 Microsoft deal.
The 2025 recapitalization was discussed at trial, but it was ancillary since all that changed was the existing for-profit changed from a capped-profit with weird cash flow mechanics to a traditional public benefit corp with ordinary equity.
> Musk lost today because the jury found that he waited too long to bring his claims.
I think Musk's lawyers told him he'd probably lose this suit before he filed it. I suspect he proceeded mostly out of spite and to embarrass Altman by ensuring the concerns even his friends had about his candor and trustworthiness went on the record and were splashed across the media. Musk knew he had little chance of unwinding the theft of a non-profit (and I doubt he cared much about that).
It would have been much better if Musk had actually cared enough about OAI's original mission to bring suit in 2019. However, I'm still glad Musk did this now because Altman and Brockman (with the help of MSFT and others) DID steal a non-profit, or at least subverted it's mission. And this fleeting bit of public embarrassment (funded by Musk for other spiteful reasons) is the only penalty they'll ever see.
It is possible for Musk to appeal, but success is vanishingly unlikely.
He doesn't have to win to succeed.
The richest man on the planet can keep his enemies tied up in court needlessly until the day he dies.
Or just ruin their already shaky reputations.
The guy he's suing is also a billionaire who can keep his enemies tied up in court needlessly until the day he dies, although that billionaire's net worth is only around 1% of Elon Musk's, so in a sense you're right that Musk is picking on the little guy.
For people unfamiliar, generally speaking in trial courts the jury is the finder of facts and the judge is the finder of law (yes, there are bench trials where the judge does both). As an aside, appeals courts deal in legal issues (ie statutory interpretations and constitutional issues).
So not being within the statute of limitations is typically a legal issue so what must've happened here is the jury would've been asked if the earlier OpenAI-MS deals were substantially similar to the latest deal. I can't find the verdict form or the jury instructions but I'll bet that was the key issue the jury decided.
That fact here was if Musk should have known about the potential breach of charitable trust before 2021 given it started in 2019, if not before, with Microsoft investment and he didn't sue until 2024. There is a 3 year statute of limitations.
>Musk could have brought the same lawsuit in 2019 or 2021, meaning his claims were untimely for the 3 year statute of limitations.
Why is a hypothetical ground for this decision? "You didn't complain immediately the first time you got robbed, therefore all the robbing since then is covered by a statute of limitation".
The statute of limitations exists to prevent unreasonable delay, to protect defendants from prejudice due to loss of evidence to the passage of time, and to recognize that people who are injured tend to complain immediately and not sit on their claims.
This case demonstrates why. Musk only complained after OpenAI was commercially successful with ChatGPT and after he started a competing effort. He repeatedly said “I do not know” and “I do not recall” on the stand, and argued that the passage of time made it hard for him to remember facts that would have been helpful for OpenAI.
I know why statutes of limitation exist. I was wondering why it applied here. Apparently it wasn't completely straightforward, as nine jurors were needed to reach a decision on that point, instead of a single judge or even clerk.
Whether the claim accrued before the statute of limitations expired is a question of fact, and is therefore reserved for the fact-finder which in this case was the jury.
IMHO, whether (and which) statue of limitations applies is a question of law, whether said time limit has passed is a question of fact. I'd like to read the jury instructions and verdict, but I didn't see a link to them anywhere.
I guess there could be a question of fact in a case where the statues of limitation differ for different injuries, and the factual question is which injury was it.
You are correct that which statute of limitations applies is a question of law. If facts are undisputed, that is the end of the issue. In this case, the facts were disputed, and the jury found for the defendants.
The jury instructions are public and the final jury form will be published, likely later this week.
I can tell you that the instructions told the jury to decide whether Musk could have brought his case before 2021.
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No, that is incorrect.
It seems to me like justice should be about right vs wrong and illegal vs legal, and not “did you fill out form 27B/6 on time?” Dismissing a case on these kinds of trivial procedural grounds seems like the court just doesn’t want to do its job.
Have you ever gotten into a fender bender and not had insurance involved? After resolving that situation, do you think it would be "justice" for the person you got into the fender bender with to come after you 20 years after the fact demanding compensation for 20 years of medical bills that they swear is related to injuries sustained in that horrific crash that you negligently caused? How would you even begin to construct a defense for yourself? Even assuming you still had the car, what is the likelihood it's in the same condition it was after that collision? How likely is it that you have a perfect 20 years of maintenance and repair records for that car? How likely is it that you have any evidence about what medications or substances you were or were not taking 20 years ago? How likely is it you could find any witnesses to the wreck from 20 years ago?
At a certain point, "justice" is deciding that it is impossible to fairly and reasonably adjudicate the dispute in question, and that it is better to have let a guilty person go free than to punish an innocent person. Statutes of limitation are one part of that package of procedures we have in place to make the process as fair and equitable as possible.
The statute of limitations is not a trivial issue. Defendants have rights just as much as plaintiffs do, and our justice system does not allow plaintiffs to unreasonably delay in bringing their claims.
there are also practical concerns at play with a statute of limitations, where evidence is more likely to disappear and the trial would've devolved into a he said/she said situation.
If it was wrong in 2019, why did he wait 7 years to do something about it?
The passage of time makes it harder to have a fair trial, as shown by the number of times Elon said I don't know or I don't recall about conversations that would have been recent in 2019 but are now long (or strategically) forgotten.
Why would you try to sue something that has no chance of being alive?
Bringing claims promptly so they can be adjudicated is vital for justice. What would you think if you were sued for something that happened decades ago when the time to correct it was soon after the instigating event?
So you’d be OK if, say, a rental car sued you for putative damage to a car you rented 15 years ago?
Limiting time that an action can be brought is critical to having a fair trial.
Because civil cases are based on the preponderance of the evidence rather than beyond a reasonable doubt, plaintiffs have a much lower bar to clear for winning. However, because of the ease that they may win, there needs to be protections for defendants to ensure that it's fair. If you show up with yellowed documents claiming the defendant did something yet the defendant has, reasonably, lost the records that could disprove the claim, why should the plaintiff have the advantage? If the only thing you need to win an ancient lawsuit is to just hold onto records longer than the other guy, that's not an effective system.
It doesn't seem trivial at all. Allowing to flout procedure specially in case of very rich , powerful people with vast resources at their disposal would feel rewarding further for their cluelessness as if they are not already heavily rewarded by rigged system.
How do you imagine justice functioning in a system that lacks a statute of limitations?
I for one am happy that we have and enforce statutes of limitations. Calling it a kind of "trivial procedural grounds" is wild.
> the court just doesn’t want to do its job.
What do you think its job is.
In the US, court clerks do not decide cases. This was a jury trial, so the jury was required to do its job.
Because there has to be some point. It's unjust to allow someone to sue 30 years later, as everyone would have a sword of Damocles hanging over their head waiting for the right moment to strike. And in general, if you didn't realize you were robbed for 3 years, perhaps it's the case that you weren't actually robbed.
So if I exchange your Rolex with a fake one and then you try to sell after 3 years and you notice it’s fake, it’s fine for you?
The statute of limitations takes into account when the plaintiff discovered or with reasonable diligence should have discovered their injury.
In this case, the jury found that Musk knew or should have known of his alleged injury prior to 2021.
Statute of limitations kicks in at the moment of your awareness of the watch being fake. But, you and the plaintiff might dispute over the fact of when you learned the watch was fake. That’s exactly what this jury decision was about. Musk claimed he wasn’t aware of OpenAI’s for profit push until 2022. Altman claimed he was aware of it as far back as 2017 or 2019. The Jury looked at texts and emails and interviewed witnesses and decided that Musk was aware of it in 2019, which is more than 3 years before he filed the suit in 2024.
There is the notion of equitable estoppel, that would *perhaps*, depending on the facts, apply which stops a defendant, who for instance concealed or committed certain acts of fraud, from raising the statute of limitations defense.
Edit: to augment the sibling comment.
There are multiple reasons why statutes of limitations exist, one of them being that the further away in time, the harder it is to prove evidence. Witnesses may have died, or their memory may be more faulty.
Also criminal liability is generally handled differently. Some jurisdictions have no limit, and where the limits exist for criminal liability, limitations on serious crimes can be much longer than the civil ones.
https://localnewsmatters.org/2026/05/16/musk-v-altman-week-3... has a good explanation of the legalities:
"If the jury determines that at any time before those dates, Musk either knew — or had or should have known — that he had a claim that he could bring, then his suit was brought too late. The consequence of being too late is swift and absolute. If the lawsuit was filed late for a particular claim, that claim is out of the case; if it was too late for all of Musk’s claims, the lawsuit is over."
That's where the question of fact (i.e., the requirement for a jury decision) came in: "What was the statute of limitations?" is a question of law, but "When should Musk have known that OpenAI was moving too much toward for-profit?" is a question of fact (and, here, determines whether the statute of limitations applies).
This is not a robbery, though. Not in the "break in and steal stuff from your house multiple times" situation. Legally, each of those are separate events, and one doesn't really affect the other unless it's all the same person, and the repetition is used to get a stronger case, etc.
There are several legal principles in play here. Note that these are civil trial issues and when you're talking about "robbing", you're likely talking about a criminal issue. These are:
1. Estoppel. If a party relies on your conduct then you can lose the right to sue over it;
2. Laches. This is a defense against prejudicial conduct, typically by waiting too long to take action;
3. Waiver. Your conduct can waive your right to sue. Imagine you live with someone and they don't pay half of the rent so you cover it. At some point your continued conduct means you lose the right to sue; and
4. The statute of limitations. Some claims simply have to be brought within a certain period. How this applies can be really complex. For example, we saw this in Trump's fraud convictions in New York. His time in office, away from the jurisdiction, essentially suspended the statute of limitations.
Some crimes like murder have no statute of limitations. Others have unreasonably short statutes of limitations. For example, probably nobody can be charged in relation to sex trafficking in the Epstein saga because the statute of limitations is often 5 years with such crimes. This is unreasonable (IMHO) because often the victims are children and unable to make a criminal complaint.
It's also worth adding that not all legal systems have such wide-ranging statutes of limitation as the US does. Founding principles of those other legal systems is that the government shouldn't be arbitrarily restricted for prosecuting criminal conduct. The US system ostensibly favors "timely" prosecution.
There sure was a lot of days of testimony on Sam Altman lying, for this to come down to " statute of limitations".
Shouldn't the defense have raised the statute of limitations much earlier?
You raise all your defenses in the trial, you only get one. If they'd wanted to put all their eggs on the statute of limitations point then they could, but you can understand why defense lawyers generally don't do that.
From other comments, it came down to when Musk could reasonably be judged as aware of the injury.
Agree. If this is a precondition, why force people to share their diaries and stuff? Is it all to claim they hid material things that would have led to an earlier filing?
thanks for the snippet
If it's thrown out on a technicality then Musk got fleeced by his lawyers - good for them.