Sam Altman texted Elon Musk after finding out about OpenAI lawsuit, here is what happened next

A couple of days back, Elon Musk made headlines for his decision to fire OpenAI, saying that the company had abandoned its original mission and had violated its contract. In the lawsuit, Musk also accused OpenAI of malpractice and argued that OpenAI, along with its president Gregory Brockman and CEO Sam Altman, as well as Microsoft should be barred from benefiting from the company’s artificial general intelligence technology. Shortly after the lawsuit was filed, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was seen sharing an old Twitter (now called X) exchange, trying to remind Musk of how he stood by him when people were against Tesla in 2019.

And now, Altman has revealed in an interview that he had texted Musk right after finding out about the lawsuit. And what followed was exchanging of some “emojis.”

Sam Altman reveals texting Elon Musk after OpenAI lawsuit

In an interview with journalist Kara Swisher, Altman said that he texted Musk “something trivial” after Musk had filed the lawsuit against OpenAI. Swisher then prompted Altman to reveal exactly what he said and wondered if it was something “on the lines of WTF.”

To this, Altman responded and said that what he sent Musk was “nicer than that” and that he doesn’t exactly remember what he texted the billionaire. 

Altman told Swisher, “It was like a little bit nicer than that,” and added, “I don’t remember. You know, the spirit of that.”

Altman also revealed that he and Musk sent some emojis to each other the text. 

‘I miss the old Elon’: Sam Altman

Elon Musk was one of the founding members of OpenAI back in 2015. In 2018, Musk left the company and also let go of all of his stake in it. Altman, who was once close to Musk, told Swisher that he “misses the old Elon”. He also added that he “grew up with him as an absolute hero.”

This isn’t the first time that Altman talked about how things with Musk were earlier. 

In September last year, the OpenAI co-founder made an appearance on the In Good Company and said that Elon Musk had some ‘real superpowers’ that helped OpenAI during its early days.

“Elon was definitely a talent magnet and attention magnet, for sure, and also just like has some real superpowers that were super helpful to us in those early days, aside from all of those things,” he had said. 

Elon Musk’s lawsuit

Musk sued Altman’s OpenAI on February 29 and accused the company of breaching its contract and indulging in unfair business practices. In the lawsuit, Musk said that OpenAI’s focus on maximising profits for Microsoft, instead of benefiting humanity, goes against the company’s original mission.

After the lawsuit, OpenAI responded and “refuted all claims of Musk”. Intensifying the battle, OpenAI released a blog post that contained Musk’s old emails to the company’s founders in which he could be seen backing the for-profit arm idea of OpenAI, and suggesting merging OpenAI with Tesla. The company also filed a legal response, saying Musk wants all success to himself.