Elon Musk Files Suit Against AI Giant, Argues Their Tech No Longer Benefits Humanity
As the world continues to rapidly change, something needs to be done to make sure that change is for the better.
AI has grown into being a mainstay in everyday life. As companies look for further ways to implement the program into their businesses, there’s a large future for its application.
But what’s stopping its development from straying away from helping and moving toward hurting instead?
Billionaire Elon Musk believes that it’s already beginning to take a turn for the worse, and now he is suing OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman over the issue, according to TechCrunch.
BREAKING: Elon Musk has filed a lawsuit against Open AI and Sam Altman for breach of contract.
The lawsuit accuses Altman et al with having betrayed an agreement from Open AI's founding to remain as a non-profit company. pic.twitter.com/GPv8NFvsnt
— X Daily News (@xDaily) March 1, 2024
Musk was a primary funder of the tech startup and had secured the agreement between Altman and company president Greg Brockman to keep OpenAI as a non-profit.
The suit claims that the artificial intelligence company has betrayed an agreement made during its creation to benefit humanity as a whole, rather than the company itself.
“OpenAI, Inc. has been transformed into a closed-source de facto subsidiary of the largest technology company in the world: Microsoft,” the lawsuit reads. “Under its new Board, it is not just developing but is actually refining an AGI to maximize profits for Microsoft, rather than for the benefit of humanity.”
AGI, according to the Associated Press, stands for artificial general intelligence, which is AI developed to perform tasks as well or even better than human beings would be able to do, creating concerning ideas of replacement of human workers for major corporations looking to maximize profits.
The lawsuit points specifically to GPT-4, which it claims constitutes AGI and has been improperly licensed by OpenAI and Microsoft, according to TechCrunch. It’s hoped that the court will rule that GPT-4 and any similar programs will be ruled as AGI and, therefore, not subject to licensing agreements.
The tech billionaire also requested accounting records for the possibility of restitution, as the company would have violated its public-orientated model.
The suit also calls out Altman for modifying the company structure to further allow for the change in the company vision. That move came after Altman was suddenly fired late last year by the nonprofit board “for reasons that still haven’t been fully disclosed,” according to the AP.
Shortly thereafter, the news outlet reported, Microsoft “helped drive the push that brought Altman back as CEO and led most of the old board to resign.”
That, in turn, Musk’s suit claimed, eliminated the nonprofit mission’s checks and balances, causing them to “collapse overnight.”
“Mr. Altman hand-picked a new Board that lacks similar technical expertise or any substantial background in AI governance, which the previous board had by design,” the suit charged, according to Tech Crunch. “Mr. D’Angelo, a tech CEO and entrepreneur, was the only member of the previous board to remain after Mr. Altman’s return.
“The new Board consisted of members with more experience in profit-centric enterprises or politics than in AI ethics and governance,” it continued.
AI is a slippery slope that can quickly become something that no longer serves the public and instead serves those wishing to maximize profits.
For years, Musk has been vocal in sounding the alarm about AI, at one point saying the technology is “potentially more dangerous than nukes.”
Worth reading Superintelligence by Bostrom. We need to be super careful with AI. Potentially more dangerous than nukes.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 3, 2014
Others appear to see only the potential for profit. Microsoft itself has said that it invests money into AI companies for “new commercial opportunities,” according to CNBC. The company announced Monday it was investing in French tech company Mistral AI, Europe’s version of OpenAI.
The massive tech company previously invested a whopping $13 billion into OpenAI, undoubtedly for the same reasons it invested in Mistral AI.
While companies like OpenAI look to the public and claim they work for the betterment of humanity, actions speak much louder than words.
If they’re allowed to be more concerned with lining their pockets than ensuring that they don’t massively disrupt the workforce, they have no right to be in the positions they occupy.
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