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    Sam Altman on Microsoft, Trump and Musk

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    The OpenAI C.E.O. spoke with Andrew Ross Sorkin at the DealBook Summit.Since kicking off the artificial intelligence boom with the launch of ChatGPT in 2022, OpenAI has amassed more than 300 million weekly users and a $157 billion valuation. Its C.E.O., Sam Altman, addressed whether that staggering pace of growth can continue at the DealBook Summit last week.Altman pushed back on assertions that progress in A.I. is becoming slower and more expensive; on reports that the company’s relationship with its biggest investor, Microsoft, is fraying; and on concerns that Elon Musk, who founded an A.I. company last year, may use his relationship with President-elect Donald Trump to hurt competitors.Altman said that artificial general intelligence, the point at which artificial intelligence can do almost anything that a human brain can do, will arrive “sooner than most people in the world think.” Here are five highlights from the conversation.On Elon MuskMusk, who co-founded OpenAI, has become one of its major antagonists. He has sued the company, accusing it of departing from its founding mission as a nonprofit, and started a competing startup called xAI. On Friday, OpenAI said Musk had wanted to turn OpenAI into a for-profit company in 2017 and walked away when he didn’t get majority equity. Altman called the change in the relationship “tremendously sad.” He continued:I grew up with Elon as like a mega hero. I thought what Elon was doing was absolutely incredible for the world, and I’m still, of course, I mean, I have different feelings about him now, but I’m still glad he exists. I mean that genuinely. Not just because I think his companies are awesome, which I do think, but because I think at a time when most of the world was not thinking very ambitiously, he pushed a lot of people, me included, to think much more ambitiously. And grateful is the wrong kind of word. But I’m like thankful.You know, we started OpenAI together, and then at some point he totally lost faith in OpenAI and decided to go his own way. And that’s fine, too. But I think of Elon as a builder and someone who — a known thing about Elon is that he really cares about being ‘the guy.’ But I think of him as someone who, if he’s not, that just competes in the market and in the technology, and whatever else. And doesn’t resort to lawfare. And, you know, whatever the stated complaint is, what I believe is he’s a competitor and we’re doing well. And that’s sad to see.Altman said of Musk’s close relationship with Trump:I may turn out to be wrong, but I believe pretty strongly that Elon will do the right thing and that it would be profoundly un-American to use political power to the degree that Elon has it to hurt your competitors and advantage your own businesses. And I don’t think people would tolerate that. I don’t think Elon would do it.On OpenAI’s relationship with MicrosoftMicrosoft, OpenAI’s largest investor, has put more than $13 billion into the company and has an exclusive license to its raw technologies. Altman once called the relationship “the best bromance in tech,” but The Times and others have reported that the partnership has become strained as OpenAI seeks more and cheaper access to computing power and Microsoft has made moves to diversify its access to A.I. technology. OpenAI expects to lose $5 billion this year because of the steep costs of developing A.I.At the DealBook Summit, Altman said of the relationship with Microsoft, “I don’t think we’re disentangling. I will not pretend that there are no misalignments or challenges.” He added:We need lots of compute, more than we projected. And that has just been an unusual thing in the history of business, to scale that quickly. And there’s been tension on that.Some of OpenAI’s own products compete with those of partners that depend on its technologies. On whether that presents a conflict of interest, Altman said:We have a big platform business. We have a big first party business. Many other companies manage both of those things. And we have things that we’re really good at. Microsoft has things they’re really good at. Again, there’s not no tension, but on the whole, our incentives are pretty aligned.On whether making progress in A.I. development was becoming more expensive and slower, as some experts have suggested, he doubled down on a message he’d previously posted on social media: “There is no wall.” Andrew asked the same question of Sundar Pichai, the Google C.E.O., which we’ll recap in tomorrow’s newsletter.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      OpenAI Fires Back at Elon Musk’s Lawsuit

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      The artificial intelligence start-up argues that Mr. Musk is trying to hamstring its business as he builds a rival company.Earlier this month, Elon Musk asked a federal court to block OpenAI’s efforts to transform itself from a nonprofit into a purely for-profit company.On Friday, OpenAI responded with its own legal filing, arguing that Mr. Musk is merely trying to hamstring OpenAI as he builds a rival company, called xAI.What Mr. Musk is asking for would “debilitate OpenAI’s business, board deliberations, and mission to create safe and beneficial A.I. — all to the advantage of Musk and his own A.I. company,” the filing said. “The motion should be denied.”OpenAI also disputed many of the claims made by Mr. Musk in the lawsuit he brought against OpenAI earlier this year. In a blog post published before Friday’s filing, OpenAI portrayed Mr. Musk as a hypocrite, saying that he had tried to transform the lab from a nonprofit into a for-profit operation before he left the organization six years ago.The filing and blog post included documents claiming to show that in 2017, Jared Birchall, the head of Mr. Musk’s family office, registered a company called Open Artificial Intelligence Technologies, Inc. that was meant to be a for-profit incarnation of OpenAI.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Musk, Trump, A.I. and Other DealBook Summit Highlights

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      The economy, inflation, tariffs, the future of media, pardon politics and other big topics that made headlines this year.Jeff Bezos was cautiously optimistic that President-elect Donald Trump would be more measured in his second term.Michael M. Santiago/Getty ImagesFour takeaways from the DealBook Summit The U.S. election dominated the news agenda this year, and the two people at the center of Donald Trump’s win came up in nearly every conversation yesterday at the DealBook Summit. The president-elect and Elon Musk may not have been in the room, but questions about how they will shape business and politics were front and center.The general view of the day was cautious optimism, even among those who had publicly criticized Trump and Musk — or been targeted by them.But many questions remain. What will Trump and Musk mean for government, business and the economy? Will they succeed in cutting regulation and government spending? And will they go after their perceived enemies and rivals?Here are four big themes from this year’s event.What will happen with the economy?Most of the speakers were willing to give Trump the benefit of the doubt, or at least played down worries about his most disruptive policy ideas.Jay Powell, the Fed chair, addressed one of the biggest questions hanging over the next administration: Will the president-elect go after the central bank’s independence? No, Powell said emphatically. The Fed, he said, was created by Congress and its autonomy is “the law of the land.”“There is very, very broad support for that set of ideas in Congress in both political parties, on both sides of the Hill, and that’s what really matters,” he said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      The Biggest Takeaways From the DealBook Summit With Jeff Bezos, Sam Altman and More

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      Serena Williams, Jerome H. Powell, Jeff Bezos and other leaders across business and technology discussed artificial intelligence, inflation, the media and what the world would look like under a second Donald J. Trump presidency.Mr. Bezos, for one, thinks the president-elect has “a good chance of succeeding.”Elon Musk wasn’t in the room, but he was present throughout at the DealBook Summit. The speakers were largely optimistic about his efforts in the new administration.The event, hosted by Andrew Ross Sorkin, founder of DealBook, has taken place since 2011.Here are five main themes:Inflation is still an issue, but there’s a chance for growth.Jerome H. Powell, the chair of the Federal Reserve, said the economy was in a “very good place.” Inflation has come down, and the labor market has rebounded. The big takeaway for investors: The central bank can afford to be more cautious when it considers lowering interest rates, Mr. Powell said. (The next Fed meeting will be Dec. 17-18.)Ken Griffin, the billionaire founder of the hedge fund Citadel and a top donor to the Republican Party, placed the blame for inflation squarely on the Biden administration, which, he argued, “put this country on an inflationary path that was unprecedented in our lifetime.” Mr. Powell has “had to deal with cleaning up the mess,” he added.Former President Bill Clinton said inflation was the “fundamental problem” that helped Mr. Trump return to the White House.“The average person had not really lived through something like this for 40 years, since the ’70s,” Mr. Clinton said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Microsoft and OpenAI’s Close Partnership Shows Signs of Fraying

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      The “best bromance in tech” has had a reality check as OpenAI has tried to change its deal with Microsoft and the software maker has tried to hedge its bet on the start-up.Last fall, Sam Altman, OpenAI’s chief executive, asked his counterpart at Microsoft, Satya Nadella, if the tech giant would invest billions of dollars in the start-up.Microsoft had already pumped $13 billion into OpenAI, and Mr. Nadella was initially willing to keep the cash spigot flowing. But after OpenAI’s board of directors briefly ousted Mr. Altman last November, Mr. Nadella and Microsoft reconsidered, according to four people familiar with the talks who spoke on the condition of anonymity.Over the next few months, Microsoft wouldn’t budge as OpenAI, which expects to lose $5 billion this year, continued to ask for more money and more computing power to build and run its A.I. systems.Mr. Altman once called OpenAI’s partnership with Microsoft “the best bromance in tech,” but ties between the companies have started to fray. Financial pressure on OpenAI, concern about its stability and disagreements between employees of the two companies have strained their five-year partnership, according to interviews with 19 people familiar with the relationship between the companies.That tension demonstrates a key challenge for A.I. start-ups: They are dependent on the world’s tech giants for money and computing power because those big companies control the massive cloud computing systems the small outfits need to develop A.I.No pairing displays this dynamic better than Microsoft and OpenAI, the maker of the ChatGPT chatbot. When OpenAI got its giant investment from Microsoft, it agreed to an exclusive deal to buy computing power from Microsoft and work closely with the tech giant on new A.I.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      OpenAI Names Political Veteran Chris Lehane as Head of Global Policy

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      The prominent A.I. start-up is also considering a change to its corporate structure to make it more appealing to outside investors.Amid a flurry of news around its funding plans, OpenAI has tapped the political veteran Chris Lehane as its vice president of global policy.Mr. Lehane held a similar role at Airbnb and served in the Clinton White House as a lawyer and spokesman who specialized in opposition research. He earned a reputation as “the master of disaster” during his time working for President Bill Clinton.As OpenAI has built increasingly powerful artificial intelligence technologies, it has warned of their potential danger, and it is under pressure from lawmakers, regulators and others across the globe to ensure that these technologies do not cause serious harm. Some researchers worry that the A.I. systems could be used to spread disinformation, fuel cyberattacks or even destroy humanity.Mr. Lehane could help navigate an increasingly complex social and political landscape. Through a spokeswoman, he declined to comment.A spokeswoman for OpenAI, Liz Bourgeois, said, “Just as the company is making changes in other areas of the business to scale the impact of various teams as we enter this next chapter, we recently made changes to our global affairs organization.”OpenAI is negotiating a new funding deal that would value the company at more than $100 billion, three people familiar with discussions have said. The deal would be led by the investment firm Thrive Capital, which would invest more than $1 billion.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Scarlett Johansson Said No, but OpenAI’s Virtual Assistant Sounds Just Like Her

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      Last week, the company released a chatbot with an option that sounded like the actress, who provided the voice of an A.I. system in the movie “Her.”Days before OpenAI demonstrated its new, flirty voice assistant last week, the actress Scarlett Johansson said, Sam Altman, the company’s chief executive, called her agent and asked that she consider licensing her voice for a virtual assistant.It was his second request to the actress in the past year, Ms. Johannson said in a statement on Monday, adding that the reply both times was no.Despite those refusals, Ms. Johansson said, OpenAI used a voice that sounded “eerily similar to mine.” She has hired a lawyer and asked OpenAI to stop using a voice it called “Sky.”OpenAI suspended its release of “Sky” over the weekend. The company said in a blog post on Sunday that “AI voices should not deliberately mimic a celebrity’s distinctive voice — Sky’s voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice.”For Ms. Johansson, the episode has been a surreal case of life-imitating art. In 2013, she provided the voice for an A.I. system in the Spike Jonze movie “Her.” The film told the story of a lonely introvert seduced by a virtual assistant named Samantha, a tragic commentary on the potential pitfalls of technology as it becomes more realistic.Last week, Mr. Altman appeared to nod to the similarity between OpenAI’s virtual assistant and the film in a post on X with the single word “her.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Scarlett Johansson’s Statement About Her Interactions With Sam Altman

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      The actress released a lengthy statement about the company and the similarity of one of its A.I. voices.Here is Scarlett Johansson’s statement on Monday:“Last September, I received an offer from Sam Altman, who wanted to hire me to voice the current ChatGPT 4.0 system. He told me that he felt that by my voicing the system, I could bridge the gap between tech companies and creatives and help consumers to feel comfortable with the seismic shift concerning humans and A.I. He said he felt that my voice would be comforting to people. After much consideration and for personal reasons, I declined the offer. Nine months later, my friends, family and the general public all noted how much the newest system named ‘Sky’ sounded like me.“When I heard the released demo, I was shocked, angered and in disbelief that Mr. Altman would pursue a voice that sounded so eerily similar to mine that my closest friends and news outlets could not tell the difference. Mr. Altman even insinuated that the similarity was intentional, tweeting a single word, ‘her’ — a reference to the film in which I voiced a chat system, Samantha, who forms an intimate relationship with a human.“Two days before the ChatGPT 4.0 demo was released, Mr. Altman contacted my agent, asking me to reconsider. Before we could connect, the system was out there. As a result of their actions, I was forced to hire legal counsel, who wrote two letters to Mr. Altman and OpenAI, setting out what they had done and asking them to detail the exact process by which they created the ‘Sky’ voice. Consequently, OpenAI reluctantly agreed to take down the ‘Sky’ voice.“In a time when we are all grappling with deepfakes and the protection of our own likeness, our own work, our own identities, I believe these are questions that deserve absolute clarity. I look forward to resolution in the form of transparency and the passage of appropriate legislation to help ensure that individual rights are protected.” More

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      The Big Questions Raised by Elon Musk’s Lawsuit Against OpenAI

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      Experts say the case against the start-up and its chief executive, Sam Altman, raises unusual legal issues that do not have a clear precedent.From Silicon Valley to Wall Street to Washington, the blockbuster case that Elon Musk filed against OpenAI and its C.E.O., Sam Altman, has become Topic A. It is the business world’s hottest soap opera.But among lawyers, the case has become something of a fascination for a different reason: It poses a series of unique and unusual legal questions without clear precedent. And it remains unclear what would constitute “winning” in a case like this, given that it appears to have been brought out of Musk’s own personal frustration and philosophical differences with Open A.I, a company he helped found and then left.The lawsuit — which pits one of the wealthiest men in the world against the most advanced A.I. company in the world, backed by Microsoft, one the world’s most valuable companies — argues that OpenAI, a nonprofit organization that created a for-profit subsidiary in 2019, breached a contract to operate in the public interest and violated its duties by diverting from its founding purpose of benefiting humanity.Musk’s lawyers — led by Morgan Chu, a partner at Irell & Manella who is known as the “$5 billion man” for his win record — want the court to force OpenAI to open its technology to others and to stop licensing it to Microsoft, which has invested billions in its partnership with the start-up.Among the questions that lawyers and scholars are asking after poring through Musk’s 35-page complaint:Does Musk even have standing to sue? “One of the differences with nonprofits compared to other companies is that, generally, no one other than the state attorney general has standing to sue for the kind of stuff that he’s complaining about, like not following your mission,“ Peter Molk, a professor of law at the University of Florida, said of Musk’s lawsuit. That’s most likely why Musk’s lawyers are presenting the case as a breach of contract instead of attacking the company’s nonprofit status.Musk also alleges that OpenAI has breached its fiduciary duty, but that charge has its own challenges, lawyers said, given that such claims are traditionally handled in Delaware, not California, where the lawsuit was filed. (Musk, of course, has an infamously rocky relationship with the state of Delaware.)We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More