Among the many most attention-grabbing components of Elon Musk’s testimony Tuesday in his lawsuit in opposition to OpenAI wasn’t the charity he claims was stolen from him (all of us knew that was coming). It was about an previous good friend.
Musk testified that considered one of his core motivations for co-founding OpenAI was a falling-out with Google’s Larry Web page over AI security — particularly, a dialog wherein Musk raised the prospect of AI wiping out humanity and Web page shrugged it off as “wonderful,” as long as AI itself survived. Web page referred to as Musk a “speciest” for being “professional human.” Musk referred to as the perspective “insane.”
That’s largely notable given how shut the 2 as soon as have been. Fortune included them on its 2016 record of secretly best-friend enterprise leaders; Musk was so comfy with Web page that he usually crashed at his Palo Alto dwelling. Web page as soon as advised Charlie Rose that he’d reasonably give his money to Musk than to charity.
The friendship didn’t survive OpenAI. When Musk recruited Google AI star Ilya Sutskever to assist launch the corporate in 2015, Web page felt personally betrayed and reduce off contact.
It’s a narrative Musk has advised earlier than — together with to creator Walter Isaacson for his bestselling biography of Musk — however Tuesday was the primary time he mentioned it below oath. Web page hasn’t commented, and it’s value remembering every part that Musk mentioned was in service of a lawsuit. Nonetheless, as just lately as 2023 he advised tech podcaster Lex Fridman he wished to patch issues up: “We have been mates for a really very long time.”
