ELON MUSK’S LAWSUIT against Sam Altman and OpenAI has offered plenty of twists and turns since its dramatic filing in San Francisco state court in February 2024.

On Tuesday, 20 days before trial begins in the Oakland federal courthouse where the case is now pending, Musk added another: he isn’t seeking anything for himself.

In the underlying case, Musk sued OpenAI, the artificial intelligence developer he cofounded with Altman and funded with charitable contributions, alleging that Altman perverted the original nonprofit mission to develop AI “for the benefit of humanity.”

In a surprise filing Tuesday that amended an earlier notice of the “remedies” he was seeking in the case, Musk said he will not seek “a remedy directed to benefiting himself personally.”

In addition, he said that if he proves at trial that Altman and the other defendants are liable for breaching the charitable mission, he will ask the court to impose a suite of “equitable remedies.”

The remedies would remove Altman as CEO and director of OpenAI as well as require the enterprise to honor its original charitable undertaking and operate for the benefit of humanity and not for the financial benefit of any individual.

“It was supposed to be for humaity!” (AI illustration by Joe Dworetzky/Bay City News via ChatGPT)

The proposed remedies would also require Altman and co-founder Gregory Brockman to give up their financial benefits from OpenAI and compel Microsoft — accused of aiding and abetting the breach of OpenAI’s charitable mission — to give up its allegedly ill-gotten gains.

Finally, in the most far reaching of the proposed remedies, Musk called for the restoration of the company’s original nonprofit structure and the complete unwinding of the for-profit enterprise that currently operates OpenAI’s commercial development of artificial intelligence. Such a structural change would likely undo the company’s October 2025 restructuring previously greenlighted by the attorneys general of California and Delaware, the states with regulatory authority over OpenAI’s charitable mission.

Financing a personal ‘wealth machine’

The rationale for Musk’s proposed relief was that Altman and the other defendants solicited his financial contributions “under solemn promises that OpenAI would operate as a nonprofit for the benefit of humanity,” but “converted those assets into a wealth machine for themselves, Microsoft, and Silicon Valley insiders.”

Tuesday’s filing comes late in the case, well after Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers made a series of rulings to streamline and organize the case for a four-week jury trial. Her reaction to the amendment and its timing is currently unknown.

Musk’s filing suggests he amended the earlier notice of remedies to make clear the full range of relief he was seeking.

Musk’s lawsuit seeks the restoration of OpenAI’s original nonprofit structure and the complete unwinding of the for-profit enterprise that currently operates its commercial development of artificial intelligence.

“To whatever extent the central role of injunctive relief was not clear from Musk’s prior filings, it should be clear now,” the filing said.

In recent months, the primary focus of the case has been on monetary relief. The original notice of remedies said the “primary monetary remedy” Musk sought was the “disgorgement” of the wrongful gains that OpenAI and Microsoft had obtained from his contributions. Disgorgement is the legal term for refunding or giving back what was wrongfully obtained.

The notice said the wrongful gains were up to $109 billion for OpenAI and up to $25 billion for Microsoft.

Disputing the math

After the original notice was filed, OpenAI and Microsoft attacked Musk’s expert witness — C. Paul Wazzan — who calculated the allegedly wrongful gains.

Wazzan’s theory was that the wrongful gains were not just the $40-odd million in donations and services that Musk directed to OpenAI when he believed that it was functioning as a nonprofit charity, but also the value of the enterprise that was created by his donations. He said between 50% and 70% of OpenAI’s current value was attributable to Musk’s donations.

OpenAI and Microsoft asked the court to strike Wazzan’s proposed expert opinion on grounds that the methodology he used was not adequately supported by academic authority.

“Where did you come up with those numbers?” (AI illustration by Joe Dworetzky/Bay City News via ChatGPT)

Gonzalez Rogers ruled in Musk’s favor saying, “the issue is not whether the Court agrees with Dr. Wazzan but whether in the context of the dispute, the methodology is unreliable or based on insufficient facts and data.” She concluded that Wazzan’s methodology was sufficiently grounded to be presented at trial.

With that ruling, it looked as if the runway was clear for Musk to make his case at trial that OpenAI and Microsoft were responsible for coughing up as much as $134 billion, a number which if it were imposed would rank as one of the largest court awards in history.

However, if there were to be such a disgorgement, court observers wondered if the funds would go to Musk, the world’s richest man.

The new filing appears to eliminate that possibility. Rather all the relief — monetary as well as the equitable remedies — would be dedicated to the development of artificial intelligence for the benefit of humanity.

ABOUT THE ILLUSTRATIONS

The illustrations in this story were created using ChatGPT based on — but not always faithful to — prompts composed by the author.

The story is the latest in our series about the Musk v. Altman litigation that began in February of 2024 when the initial complaint was filed in San Francisco exposing the fault-line tension between the development of technology for the people and the development of technology for the money. The stories we have so far written about the case are collected ➠ here.  

For the series, we decided to experiment with a visual presentation that largely eschewed traditional photography in favor of illustrations created by generative artificial intelligence. Given the subject matter of the litigation, it seemed appropriate to create the illustrations using the technology created by OpenAI.  

As journalists we are fascinated by, and suspicious of, AI.  We do not use AI to write our stories. However, using generative AI to create fanciful illustrations and cartoons (clearly labeled and unlikely to mislead a reader) in aid of a story involving the technology seems like a perfect use-case. Let us know what you think. 

Joe Dworetzky is a second career journalist. He practiced law in Philadelphia for more than 35 years, representing private and governmental clients in commercial litigation and insolvency proceedings. Joe served as City Solicitor for the City of Philadelphia under Mayor Ed Rendell and from 2009 to 2013 was one of five members of the Philadelphia School Reform Commission with responsibility for managing the city’s 250 public schools. He moved to San Francisco in 2011 and began writing fiction and pursuing a lifelong interest in editorial cartooning. Joe earned a Master’s in Journalism from Stanford University in 2020. He covers Legal Affairs and writes long form Investigative stories. His occasional cartooning can be seen in Bay Area Sketchbook. Joe encourages readers to email him story ideas and leads at joe.dworetzky@baycitynews.com.