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‘Not built right the first time’ — Musk’s xAI is starting over again, again | TechCrunch

‘Not built right the first time’ — Musk’s xAI is starting over again, again | TechCrunch

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And then there were two: Of the original 11 co-founders who kickstarted xAI with Elon Musk three years ago, only two remain as the deep learning lab continues a personnel overhaul to compete with Anthropic and OpenAI. That rebuilding, insists Musk, is by design.

“xAI was not built right first time around, so is being rebuilt from the foundations up,” Musk said Thursday on his social media platform, X. By most measures, it isn’t going all that smoothly.

The most immediate pressure is competitive. This week, xAI co-founders Zihang Dai and Guodong Zhang left the outfit after Musk complained that the company’s AI coding tools were not effectively competing with Claude Code or Codex, rival programming assistants made by Anthropic and OpenAI, respectively. Musk said the company held an all-hands meeting on Wednesday that focused on how to catch up, which he predicted would be possible by the middle of this year.

Coding tools matter so much because they’re where the money is. While an early-year surge of users was powered by xAI’s lax regulation of Grok’s ability to produce sexual and even abusive imagery, coding tools are seen as the key revenue-generating tech for AI labs. That makes xAI’s current lag in this area more than a perception issue; it’s a business problem.

The personnel overhaul extends well beyond this week. A month ago, 11 senior engineers at xAI, including two co-founders, left the company following changes Musk described as a reorganization to suit a larger business. That effort was apparently insufficient: The Financial Times reported that SpaceX and Tesla executives have parachuted into the company to evaluate employees and fire those who don’t make the grade.

The two remaining co-founders, Manuel Kroiss and Ross Nordeen, along with Musk, have their work cut out for them.

Musk is now casting a wider net for talent. On Thursday, he said on X that he and another colleage, Baris Akis, are currently reviewing rejected employment applications in the company, with an eye toward reaching out to promising candidates who should have had a chance to interview. “My apologies,” Musk added, addressing the pile of strangers he’d ghosted.

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For the sake of comparison, LinkedIn reports that xAI has just over 5,000 employees, compared to more than 7,500 at OpenAI and more than 4,700 at Anthropic.

On the hiring front, there’s at least one encouraging sign. Andrew Milich and Jason Ginsberg are joining xAI from the AI coding tool company Cursor, where the two held joint responsibility for product engineering. Unlike xAI, Cursor depends on frontier labs for access to the AI models it runs on. Their decision to join xAI may signal the importance of direct access to LLM and computing resources to run them — and suggest that xAI’s core asset, its own frontier model, is still an attractive draw.

Either way, the pressure to show results is as much external as it is internal. Now that xAI is part of SpaceX, and with a public offering of SpaceX shares anticipated, the cash-burning unit is under pressure to demonstrate real uptake on Grok, its LLM. (A stumbling AI division is not the story Musk needs investors to be reading.)

Longer term, Musk is betting on something bigger than coding tools. xAI’s Macrohard project — Musk is convinced the name is “a funny reference to Microsoft” — aims to create an AI agent capable of doing anything a white-collar worker can do on a computer. Toby Pohlen, chosen to lead the project in February, left within weeks, and this week, Business Insider reported that Macrohard was on pause.

Musk’s response has been to draft another of his companies into the project. He revealed for the first time that Macrohard is a joint effort with Tesla, which is also developing a complementary agent dubbed “Digital Optimus” — a reference to Tesla’s Optimus humanoid robot. In Musk’s description, the xAI language model would direct the Tesla agent as it performs tasks.

It’s ambitious; it’s also not unique. Instead, the vision is not far off from what Perplexity — an AI-powered search engine — is doing with its new “Everything is Computer” offering, which aims to offer enterprise users a dedicated “digital proxy” that can orchestrate their digital tasks. It also echoes what entrepreneur Peter Steinberger is now working on at OpenAI, after creating OpenClaw’s popular personal agents.

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Wednesday was a big day for the tech industry with Meta, Google, Amazon and Microsoft all reporting earnings at the same time in the afternoon. Out of the four, though, Meta was the clear loser with its shares down more than 7% even though revenue increased 33% this past quarter, the company’s fastest since 2021.

It’s probably because the company upped its already outrageous spending expectations for the year. Meta said that 2026 capital expenditures would be at least $10 billion more than expected and could top $145 billion. While emphasizing his “confidence in this investment,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that most of this increase was due to “higher component costs, particularly memory pricing.”

The AI boom has led to an unprecedented data center buildout that has constrained the global memory chip supply and increased prices for these valuable chips. The result has been a global memory crisis that has impacted not only Meta and the rest of the AI industry but also caused the prices of consumer electronics like laptops and smartphones to soar.

Meta’s $145 billion is a dramatic increase from the $72 billion capital expenditure it recorded just last year, and Zuckerberg is betting it all on an AI turnaround effort.

Meta has been left behind in the AI race as industry rivals like Google have soared past. Roughly 10 months ago, Zuckerberg acknowledged the situation and announced a major catch-up effort that saw him commit billions upon billions of dollars to research and development, and to poach talent from all over the industry, including bringing in Scale AI’s founder Alexandr Wang to lead the new Meta Superintelligence Labs AI division.

Many have been reasonably nervous about this commitment, considering that the company’s latest big bet in emerging tech, the Metaverse, has flopped dramatically. In Wednesday’s earnings report, Meta said that the Reality Labs division, which had helmed the Metaverse efforts, notched an operating loss of more than $4 billion, while only cashing in $402 million in sales. That adds to the whopping $80 billion and more the division has lost in the past six years.

But experts are somewhat more hopeful about the AI bet because, earlier this month, the tech giant debuted the first fruits of that investment with the AI model Muse Spark, a proprietary model that the company plans to open-source in the future. It’s a step in the right direction, but Meta still has to do more before it can confidently say the catch-up effort is successful.

“This was the first release from Meta Superintelligence Labs, and it shows that our work is on track to build a leading lab,” Zuckerberg assured investors in the company’s earnings call. “Now that we have a strong model, we can develop more novel products as well.”

Those novel products will include two agents, one for personal and the other for business uses, according to Zuckerberg.

“We’re already testing an early version of business AIs and weekly conversations have grown 10x since the start of this year,” Zuckerberg said.

One way that AI is clearly showing up to benefit Meta is internally. Meta CFO Susan Li said that over half a billion users weekly on Facebook and Instagram each are now watching videos translated and dubbed by AI. The company is also incorporating the new AI model into parts of its core business, like ads, and particularly into its recommendation system. The goal is to have the AI hyper-personalize feeds for users.

“Since our recommendation systems are operating at such large scale, we’ll phase in this new research and technology over time,” Zuckerberg said. “But the trend over the last few years seems clear that we are seeing an increasing return on the amount that we can improve engagement for people and value for advertisers.”

AI is also taking over internally at Meta. The company is laying off 10% of its workforce and reportedly offering voluntary buyouts to 7% of its U.S. staff, in what seems to follow a purportedly AI-driven trend that has taken Silicon Valley by storm.

On the call, executives wouldn’t say if the layoffs had to do with automation of jobs, but Li did say that a “leaner operating model” would help “offset the substantial investments we’re making.”

#Meta #Spend #Billion #Year #DueArtificial intelligence,Mark Zuckerberg,Meta">Meta Could Spend 5 Billion This Year Due to AI Wednesday was a big day for the tech industry with Meta, Google, Amazon and Microsoft all reporting earnings at the same time in the afternoon. Out of the four, though, Meta was the clear loser with its shares down more than 7% even though revenue increased 33% this past quarter, the company’s fastest since 2021. It’s probably because the company upped its already outrageous spending expectations for the year. Meta said that 2026 capital expenditures would be at least billion more than expected and could top 5 billion. While emphasizing his “confidence in this investment,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that most of this increase was due to “higher component costs, particularly memory pricing.” The AI boom has led to an unprecedented data center buildout that has constrained the global memory chip supply and increased prices for these valuable chips. The result has been a global memory crisis that has impacted not only Meta and the rest of the AI industry but also caused the prices of consumer electronics like laptops and smartphones to soar. Meta’s 5 billion is a dramatic increase from the billion capital expenditure it recorded just last year, and Zuckerberg is betting it all on an AI turnaround effort. Meta has been left behind in the AI race as industry rivals like Google have soared past. Roughly 10 months ago, Zuckerberg acknowledged the situation and announced a major catch-up effort that saw him commit billions upon billions of dollars to research and development, and to poach talent from all over the industry, including bringing in Scale AI’s founder Alexandr Wang to lead the new Meta Superintelligence Labs AI division. Many have been reasonably nervous about this commitment, considering that the company’s latest big bet in emerging tech, the Metaverse, has flopped dramatically. In Wednesday’s earnings report, Meta said that the Reality Labs division, which had helmed the Metaverse efforts, notched an operating loss of more than billion, while only cashing in 2 million in sales. That adds to the whopping billion and more the division has lost in the past six years. But experts are somewhat more hopeful about the AI bet because, earlier this month, the tech giant debuted the first fruits of that investment with the AI model Muse Spark, a proprietary model that the company plans to open-source in the future. It’s a step in the right direction, but Meta still has to do more before it can confidently say the catch-up effort is successful. “This was the first release from Meta Superintelligence Labs, and it shows that our work is on track to build a leading lab,” Zuckerberg assured investors in the company’s earnings call. “Now that we have a strong model, we can develop more novel products as well.” Those novel products will include two agents, one for personal and the other for business uses, according to Zuckerberg. “We’re already testing an early version of business AIs and weekly conversations have grown 10x since the start of this year,” Zuckerberg said. One way that AI is clearly showing up to benefit Meta is internally. Meta CFO Susan Li said that over half a billion users weekly on Facebook and Instagram each are now watching videos translated and dubbed by AI. The company is also incorporating the new AI model into parts of its core business, like ads, and particularly into its recommendation system. The goal is to have the AI hyper-personalize feeds for users. “Since our recommendation systems are operating at such large scale, we’ll phase in this new research and technology over time,” Zuckerberg said. “But the trend over the last few years seems clear that we are seeing an increasing return on the amount that we can improve engagement for people and value for advertisers.” AI is also taking over internally at Meta. The company is laying off 10% of its workforce and reportedly offering voluntary buyouts to 7% of its U.S. staff, in what seems to follow a purportedly AI-driven trend that has taken Silicon Valley by storm. On the call, executives wouldn’t say if the layoffs had to do with automation of jobs, but Li did say that a “leaner operating model” would help “offset the substantial investments we’re making.” #Meta #Spend #Billion #Year #DueArtificial intelligence,Mark Zuckerberg,Meta

fastest since 2021.

It’s probably because the company upped its already outrageous spending expectations for the year. Meta said that 2026 capital expenditures would be at least $10 billion more than expected and could top $145 billion. While emphasizing his “confidence in this investment,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that most of this increase was due to “higher component costs, particularly memory pricing.”

The AI boom has led to an unprecedented data center buildout that has constrained the global memory chip supply and increased prices for these valuable chips. The result has been a global memory crisis that has impacted not only Meta and the rest of the AI industry but also caused the prices of consumer electronics like laptops and smartphones to soar.

Meta’s $145 billion is a dramatic increase from the $72 billion capital expenditure it recorded just last year, and Zuckerberg is betting it all on an AI turnaround effort.

Meta has been left behind in the AI race as industry rivals like Google have soared past. Roughly 10 months ago, Zuckerberg acknowledged the situation and announced a major catch-up effort that saw him commit billions upon billions of dollars to research and development, and to poach talent from all over the industry, including bringing in Scale AI’s founder Alexandr Wang to lead the new Meta Superintelligence Labs AI division.

Many have been reasonably nervous about this commitment, considering that the company’s latest big bet in emerging tech, the Metaverse, has flopped dramatically. In Wednesday’s earnings report, Meta said that the Reality Labs division, which had helmed the Metaverse efforts, notched an operating loss of more than $4 billion, while only cashing in $402 million in sales. That adds to the whopping $80 billion and more the division has lost in the past six years.

But experts are somewhat more hopeful about the AI bet because, earlier this month, the tech giant debuted the first fruits of that investment with the AI model Muse Spark, a proprietary model that the company plans to open-source in the future. It’s a step in the right direction, but Meta still has to do more before it can confidently say the catch-up effort is successful.

“This was the first release from Meta Superintelligence Labs, and it shows that our work is on track to build a leading lab,” Zuckerberg assured investors in the company’s earnings call. “Now that we have a strong model, we can develop more novel products as well.”

Those novel products will include two agents, one for personal and the other for business uses, according to Zuckerberg.

“We’re already testing an early version of business AIs and weekly conversations have grown 10x since the start of this year,” Zuckerberg said.

One way that AI is clearly showing up to benefit Meta is internally. Meta CFO Susan Li said that over half a billion users weekly on Facebook and Instagram each are now watching videos translated and dubbed by AI. The company is also incorporating the new AI model into parts of its core business, like ads, and particularly into its recommendation system. The goal is to have the AI hyper-personalize feeds for users.

“Since our recommendation systems are operating at such large scale, we’ll phase in this new research and technology over time,” Zuckerberg said. “But the trend over the last few years seems clear that we are seeing an increasing return on the amount that we can improve engagement for people and value for advertisers.”

AI is also taking over internally at Meta. The company is laying off 10% of its workforce and reportedly offering voluntary buyouts to 7% of its U.S. staff, in what seems to follow a purportedly AI-driven trend that has taken Silicon Valley by storm.

On the call, executives wouldn’t say if the layoffs had to do with automation of jobs, but Li did say that a “leaner operating model” would help “offset the substantial investments we’re making.”

#Meta #Spend #Billion #Year #DueArtificial intelligence,Mark Zuckerberg,Meta">Meta Could Spend $145 Billion This Year Due to AIMeta Could Spend $145 Billion This Year Due to AI Wednesday was a big day for the tech industry with Meta, Google, Amazon and Microsoft all reporting earnings at the same time in the afternoon. Out of the four, though, Meta was the clear loser with its shares down more than 7% even though revenue increased 33% this past quarter, the company’s fastest since 2021. It’s probably because the company upped its already outrageous spending expectations for the year. Meta said that 2026 capital expenditures would be at least $10 billion more than expected and could top $145 billion. While emphasizing his “confidence in this investment,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that most of this increase was due to “higher component costs, particularly memory pricing.” The AI boom has led to an unprecedented data center buildout that has constrained the global memory chip supply and increased prices for these valuable chips. The result has been a global memory crisis that has impacted not only Meta and the rest of the AI industry but also caused the prices of consumer electronics like laptops and smartphones to soar. Meta’s $145 billion is a dramatic increase from the $72 billion capital expenditure it recorded just last year, and Zuckerberg is betting it all on an AI turnaround effort. Meta has been left behind in the AI race as industry rivals like Google have soared past. Roughly 10 months ago, Zuckerberg acknowledged the situation and announced a major catch-up effort that saw him commit billions upon billions of dollars to research and development, and to poach talent from all over the industry, including bringing in Scale AI’s founder Alexandr Wang to lead the new Meta Superintelligence Labs AI division. Many have been reasonably nervous about this commitment, considering that the company’s latest big bet in emerging tech, the Metaverse, has flopped dramatically. In Wednesday’s earnings report, Meta said that the Reality Labs division, which had helmed the Metaverse efforts, notched an operating loss of more than $4 billion, while only cashing in $402 million in sales. That adds to the whopping $80 billion and more the division has lost in the past six years. But experts are somewhat more hopeful about the AI bet because, earlier this month, the tech giant debuted the first fruits of that investment with the AI model Muse Spark, a proprietary model that the company plans to open-source in the future. It’s a step in the right direction, but Meta still has to do more before it can confidently say the catch-up effort is successful. “This was the first release from Meta Superintelligence Labs, and it shows that our work is on track to build a leading lab,” Zuckerberg assured investors in the company’s earnings call. “Now that we have a strong model, we can develop more novel products as well.” Those novel products will include two agents, one for personal and the other for business uses, according to Zuckerberg. “We’re already testing an early version of business AIs and weekly conversations have grown 10x since the start of this year,” Zuckerberg said. One way that AI is clearly showing up to benefit Meta is internally. Meta CFO Susan Li said that over half a billion users weekly on Facebook and Instagram each are now watching videos translated and dubbed by AI. The company is also incorporating the new AI model into parts of its core business, like ads, and particularly into its recommendation system. The goal is to have the AI hyper-personalize feeds for users. “Since our recommendation systems are operating at such large scale, we’ll phase in this new research and technology over time,” Zuckerberg said. “But the trend over the last few years seems clear that we are seeing an increasing return on the amount that we can improve engagement for people and value for advertisers.” AI is also taking over internally at Meta. The company is laying off 10% of its workforce and reportedly offering voluntary buyouts to 7% of its U.S. staff, in what seems to follow a purportedly AI-driven trend that has taken Silicon Valley by storm. On the call, executives wouldn’t say if the layoffs had to do with automation of jobs, but Li did say that a “leaner operating model” would help “offset the substantial investments we’re making.” #Meta #Spend #Billion #Year #DueArtificial intelligence,Mark Zuckerberg,Meta

Wednesday was a big day for the tech industry with Meta, Google, Amazon and Microsoft all reporting earnings at the same time in the afternoon. Out of the four, though, Meta was the clear loser with its shares down more than 7% even though revenue increased 33% this past quarter, the company’s fastest since 2021.

It’s probably because the company upped its already outrageous spending expectations for the year. Meta said that 2026 capital expenditures would be at least $10 billion more than expected and could top $145 billion. While emphasizing his “confidence in this investment,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that most of this increase was due to “higher component costs, particularly memory pricing.”

The AI boom has led to an unprecedented data center buildout that has constrained the global memory chip supply and increased prices for these valuable chips. The result has been a global memory crisis that has impacted not only Meta and the rest of the AI industry but also caused the prices of consumer electronics like laptops and smartphones to soar.

Meta’s $145 billion is a dramatic increase from the $72 billion capital expenditure it recorded just last year, and Zuckerberg is betting it all on an AI turnaround effort.

Meta has been left behind in the AI race as industry rivals like Google have soared past. Roughly 10 months ago, Zuckerberg acknowledged the situation and announced a major catch-up effort that saw him commit billions upon billions of dollars to research and development, and to poach talent from all over the industry, including bringing in Scale AI’s founder Alexandr Wang to lead the new Meta Superintelligence Labs AI division.

Many have been reasonably nervous about this commitment, considering that the company’s latest big bet in emerging tech, the Metaverse, has flopped dramatically. In Wednesday’s earnings report, Meta said that the Reality Labs division, which had helmed the Metaverse efforts, notched an operating loss of more than $4 billion, while only cashing in $402 million in sales. That adds to the whopping $80 billion and more the division has lost in the past six years.

But experts are somewhat more hopeful about the AI bet because, earlier this month, the tech giant debuted the first fruits of that investment with the AI model Muse Spark, a proprietary model that the company plans to open-source in the future. It’s a step in the right direction, but Meta still has to do more before it can confidently say the catch-up effort is successful.

“This was the first release from Meta Superintelligence Labs, and it shows that our work is on track to build a leading lab,” Zuckerberg assured investors in the company’s earnings call. “Now that we have a strong model, we can develop more novel products as well.”

Those novel products will include two agents, one for personal and the other for business uses, according to Zuckerberg.

“We’re already testing an early version of business AIs and weekly conversations have grown 10x since the start of this year,” Zuckerberg said.

One way that AI is clearly showing up to benefit Meta is internally. Meta CFO Susan Li said that over half a billion users weekly on Facebook and Instagram each are now watching videos translated and dubbed by AI. The company is also incorporating the new AI model into parts of its core business, like ads, and particularly into its recommendation system. The goal is to have the AI hyper-personalize feeds for users.

“Since our recommendation systems are operating at such large scale, we’ll phase in this new research and technology over time,” Zuckerberg said. “But the trend over the last few years seems clear that we are seeing an increasing return on the amount that we can improve engagement for people and value for advertisers.”

AI is also taking over internally at Meta. The company is laying off 10% of its workforce and reportedly offering voluntary buyouts to 7% of its U.S. staff, in what seems to follow a purportedly AI-driven trend that has taken Silicon Valley by storm.

On the call, executives wouldn’t say if the layoffs had to do with automation of jobs, but Li did say that a “leaner operating model” would help “offset the substantial investments we’re making.”

#Meta #Spend #Billion #Year #DueArtificial intelligence,Mark Zuckerberg,Meta

Elon Musk returned to the witness stand on Wednesday to continue telling his side of the story in his legal battle against OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman. Under cross-examination from OpenAI’s lawyers, Musk was pressed on all the ways he tried to squeeze the organization over a 2017 power struggle that he ultimately lost. Around this time, Musk tried to hire away OpenAI researchers and stopped sending it funding he had previously promised, according to emails presented as evidence in the case.

As the cross-examination began, tension rippled through the courtroom. Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers started the day by reprimanding someone in the gallery for taking a picture of Musk. OpenAI president and cofounder Greg Brockman sat behind his lawyers with a yellow legal pad in his lap, giving Musk a cold stare as he testified. Musk grew visibly frustrated on the witness stand, pausing frequently to tell OpenAI’s lawyer, William Savitt, that he saw his questions as misleading. Meanwhile, Savitt’s cross-examination was derailed by objections, technical issues, and Musk continuously claiming he doesn’t recall key details of OpenAI’s history.

Savitt showed the courtroom emails from September 2017 between Musk, Brockman, and researcher Ilya Sutskever discussing the formation of what would become OpenAI’s for-profit arm. In the thread, Musk demanded the right to choose four members of its board of directors, giving him more voting power than his cofounders, who would be left with three in total. “I would unequivocally have initial control of the company, but this will change quickly,” said Musk in one message. Sutskever wrote back rejecting the idea because he said he feared it would give Musk too much power.

Months before these negotiations started, Musk had halted payments to OpenAI, which was particularly difficult for the organization because he was then its main source of funding. Since 2016, Musk had been sending $5 million payments to OpenAI quarterly as part of a broader $1 billion pledge he made at the organization’s launch. But in the spring of 2017, he stopped sending the money. In another email from August 2017, the head of Musk’s family office, Jared Birchall, asked Musk if he should continue withholding it. Musk responded simply, “Yes.”

Around the time Musk lost the power struggle, emails show that he held discussions with executives at Tesla and Neuralink, his brain-computer interface company, about hiring OpenAI employees. At the time, Musk was still a board member of OpenAI.

Musk sent an email to a Tesla vice president in June 2017 about hiring an early OpenAI researcher, Andrej Karpathy. “Just talked to Andrej and he accepted as joining as director of Tesla Vision,” Musk wrote. “Andrej is arguably the #2 guy in the world in computer vision … The openai guys are gonna want to kill me, but it had to be done.”

On the stand, Musk argued that Karpathy was already interested in leaving OpenAI when he tried to recruit him to Tesla. “Andrej had made his decision. If he’s going to leave OpenAI, he might as well work at Tesla,” Musk said.

In October 2017, Musk also wrote to Ben Rapoport, a cofounder of Neuralink. “Hire independently or directly from OpenAI,” said Musk. “I have no problem if you pitch people at OpenAI to work at Neuralink.”

When pressed about this by Savitt, Musk argued that it would have been illegal for him not to allow Tesla and Neuralink to hire from OpenAI. “It’s illegal to restrict employment. It would be illegal to say you can’t employ people from OpenAI. You can’t have some cabal that stops people from working at the company they want to work at,” Musk said.

#Elon #Musk #Squeezed #OpenAI #Gonna #Killmodel behavior,artificial intelligence,elon musk,openai,sam altman,lawsuits">How Elon Musk Squeezed OpenAI: They ‘Are Gonna Want to Kill Me’Elon Musk returned to the witness stand on Wednesday to continue telling his side of the story in his legal battle against OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman. Under cross-examination from OpenAI’s lawyers, Musk was pressed on all the ways he tried to squeeze the organization over a 2017 power struggle that he ultimately lost. Around this time, Musk tried to hire away OpenAI researchers and stopped sending it funding he had previously promised, according to emails presented as evidence in the case.As the cross-examination began, tension rippled through the courtroom. Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers started the day by reprimanding someone in the gallery for taking a picture of Musk. OpenAI president and cofounder Greg Brockman sat behind his lawyers with a yellow legal pad in his lap, giving Musk a cold stare as he testified. Musk grew visibly frustrated on the witness stand, pausing frequently to tell OpenAI’s lawyer, William Savitt, that he saw his questions as misleading. Meanwhile, Savitt’s cross-examination was derailed by objections, technical issues, and Musk continuously claiming he doesn’t recall key details of OpenAI’s history.Savitt showed the courtroom emails from September 2017 between Musk, Brockman, and researcher Ilya Sutskever discussing the formation of what would become OpenAI’s for-profit arm. In the thread, Musk demanded the right to choose four members of its board of directors, giving him more voting power than his cofounders, who would be left with three in total. “I would unequivocally have initial control of the company, but this will change quickly,” said Musk in one message. Sutskever wrote back rejecting the idea because he said he feared it would give Musk too much power.Months before these negotiations started, Musk had halted payments to OpenAI, which was particularly difficult for the organization because he was then its main source of funding. Since 2016, Musk had been sending million payments to OpenAI quarterly as part of a broader billion pledge he made at the organization’s launch. But in the spring of 2017, he stopped sending the money. In another email from August 2017, the head of Musk’s family office, Jared Birchall, asked Musk if he should continue withholding it. Musk responded simply, “Yes.”Around the time Musk lost the power struggle, emails show that he held discussions with executives at Tesla and Neuralink, his brain-computer interface company, about hiring OpenAI employees. At the time, Musk was still a board member of OpenAI.Musk sent an email to a Tesla vice president in June 2017 about hiring an early OpenAI researcher, Andrej Karpathy. “Just talked to Andrej and he accepted as joining as director of Tesla Vision,” Musk wrote. “Andrej is arguably the #2 guy in the world in computer vision … The openai guys are gonna want to kill me, but it had to be done.”On the stand, Musk argued that Karpathy was already interested in leaving OpenAI when he tried to recruit him to Tesla. “Andrej had made his decision. If he’s going to leave OpenAI, he might as well work at Tesla,” Musk said.In October 2017, Musk also wrote to Ben Rapoport, a cofounder of Neuralink. “Hire independently or directly from OpenAI,” said Musk. “I have no problem if you pitch people at OpenAI to work at Neuralink.”When pressed about this by Savitt, Musk argued that it would have been illegal for him not to allow Tesla and Neuralink to hire from OpenAI. “It’s illegal to restrict employment. It would be illegal to say you can’t employ people from OpenAI. You can’t have some cabal that stops people from working at the company they want to work at,” Musk said.#Elon #Musk #Squeezed #OpenAI #Gonna #Killmodel behavior,artificial intelligence,elon musk,openai,sam altman,lawsuits

his side of the story in his legal battle against OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman. Under cross-examination from OpenAI’s lawyers, Musk was pressed on all the ways he tried to squeeze the organization over a 2017 power struggle that he ultimately lost. Around this time, Musk tried to hire away OpenAI researchers and stopped sending it funding he had previously promised, according to emails presented as evidence in the case.

As the cross-examination began, tension rippled through the courtroom. Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers started the day by reprimanding someone in the gallery for taking a picture of Musk. OpenAI president and cofounder Greg Brockman sat behind his lawyers with a yellow legal pad in his lap, giving Musk a cold stare as he testified. Musk grew visibly frustrated on the witness stand, pausing frequently to tell OpenAI’s lawyer, William Savitt, that he saw his questions as misleading. Meanwhile, Savitt’s cross-examination was derailed by objections, technical issues, and Musk continuously claiming he doesn’t recall key details of OpenAI’s history.

Savitt showed the courtroom emails from September 2017 between Musk, Brockman, and researcher Ilya Sutskever discussing the formation of what would become OpenAI’s for-profit arm. In the thread, Musk demanded the right to choose four members of its board of directors, giving him more voting power than his cofounders, who would be left with three in total. “I would unequivocally have initial control of the company, but this will change quickly,” said Musk in one message. Sutskever wrote back rejecting the idea because he said he feared it would give Musk too much power.

Months before these negotiations started, Musk had halted payments to OpenAI, which was particularly difficult for the organization because he was then its main source of funding. Since 2016, Musk had been sending $5 million payments to OpenAI quarterly as part of a broader $1 billion pledge he made at the organization’s launch. But in the spring of 2017, he stopped sending the money. In another email from August 2017, the head of Musk’s family office, Jared Birchall, asked Musk if he should continue withholding it. Musk responded simply, “Yes.”

Around the time Musk lost the power struggle, emails show that he held discussions with executives at Tesla and Neuralink, his brain-computer interface company, about hiring OpenAI employees. At the time, Musk was still a board member of OpenAI.

Musk sent an email to a Tesla vice president in June 2017 about hiring an early OpenAI researcher, Andrej Karpathy. “Just talked to Andrej and he accepted as joining as director of Tesla Vision,” Musk wrote. “Andrej is arguably the #2 guy in the world in computer vision … The openai guys are gonna want to kill me, but it had to be done.”

On the stand, Musk argued that Karpathy was already interested in leaving OpenAI when he tried to recruit him to Tesla. “Andrej had made his decision. If he’s going to leave OpenAI, he might as well work at Tesla,” Musk said.

In October 2017, Musk also wrote to Ben Rapoport, a cofounder of Neuralink. “Hire independently or directly from OpenAI,” said Musk. “I have no problem if you pitch people at OpenAI to work at Neuralink.”

When pressed about this by Savitt, Musk argued that it would have been illegal for him not to allow Tesla and Neuralink to hire from OpenAI. “It’s illegal to restrict employment. It would be illegal to say you can’t employ people from OpenAI. You can’t have some cabal that stops people from working at the company they want to work at,” Musk said.

#Elon #Musk #Squeezed #OpenAI #Gonna #Killmodel behavior,artificial intelligence,elon musk,openai,sam altman,lawsuits">How Elon Musk Squeezed OpenAI: They ‘Are Gonna Want to Kill Me’

Elon Musk returned to the witness stand on Wednesday to continue telling his side of the story in his legal battle against OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman. Under cross-examination from OpenAI’s lawyers, Musk was pressed on all the ways he tried to squeeze the organization over a 2017 power struggle that he ultimately lost. Around this time, Musk tried to hire away OpenAI researchers and stopped sending it funding he had previously promised, according to emails presented as evidence in the case.

As the cross-examination began, tension rippled through the courtroom. Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers started the day by reprimanding someone in the gallery for taking a picture of Musk. OpenAI president and cofounder Greg Brockman sat behind his lawyers with a yellow legal pad in his lap, giving Musk a cold stare as he testified. Musk grew visibly frustrated on the witness stand, pausing frequently to tell OpenAI’s lawyer, William Savitt, that he saw his questions as misleading. Meanwhile, Savitt’s cross-examination was derailed by objections, technical issues, and Musk continuously claiming he doesn’t recall key details of OpenAI’s history.

Savitt showed the courtroom emails from September 2017 between Musk, Brockman, and researcher Ilya Sutskever discussing the formation of what would become OpenAI’s for-profit arm. In the thread, Musk demanded the right to choose four members of its board of directors, giving him more voting power than his cofounders, who would be left with three in total. “I would unequivocally have initial control of the company, but this will change quickly,” said Musk in one message. Sutskever wrote back rejecting the idea because he said he feared it would give Musk too much power.

Months before these negotiations started, Musk had halted payments to OpenAI, which was particularly difficult for the organization because he was then its main source of funding. Since 2016, Musk had been sending $5 million payments to OpenAI quarterly as part of a broader $1 billion pledge he made at the organization’s launch. But in the spring of 2017, he stopped sending the money. In another email from August 2017, the head of Musk’s family office, Jared Birchall, asked Musk if he should continue withholding it. Musk responded simply, “Yes.”

Around the time Musk lost the power struggle, emails show that he held discussions with executives at Tesla and Neuralink, his brain-computer interface company, about hiring OpenAI employees. At the time, Musk was still a board member of OpenAI.

Musk sent an email to a Tesla vice president in June 2017 about hiring an early OpenAI researcher, Andrej Karpathy. “Just talked to Andrej and he accepted as joining as director of Tesla Vision,” Musk wrote. “Andrej is arguably the #2 guy in the world in computer vision … The openai guys are gonna want to kill me, but it had to be done.”

On the stand, Musk argued that Karpathy was already interested in leaving OpenAI when he tried to recruit him to Tesla. “Andrej had made his decision. If he’s going to leave OpenAI, he might as well work at Tesla,” Musk said.

In October 2017, Musk also wrote to Ben Rapoport, a cofounder of Neuralink. “Hire independently or directly from OpenAI,” said Musk. “I have no problem if you pitch people at OpenAI to work at Neuralink.”

When pressed about this by Savitt, Musk argued that it would have been illegal for him not to allow Tesla and Neuralink to hire from OpenAI. “It’s illegal to restrict employment. It would be illegal to say you can’t employ people from OpenAI. You can’t have some cabal that stops people from working at the company they want to work at,” Musk said.

#Elon #Musk #Squeezed #OpenAI #Gonna #Killmodel behavior,artificial intelligence,elon musk,openai,sam altman,lawsuits

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#Modernize #Microsoft #bundle">Modernize your PC for just with this Microsoft bundle TL;DR: Give your PC a total refresh with the Ultimate Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for Windows Lifetime License and Windows 11 Pro Bundle, on sale now for just .97 (reg. 8.99) through May 31. .97 8.99 Save 4.02   If you don’t have hundreds of dollars lying around for a brand new laptop, don’t worry. The Ultimate Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for Windows Lifetime License and Windows 11 Pro Bundle gives you the next best thing — fresh tools and an updated operating system to make your old PC feel shiny and new (to you).The even better news is that you can get it all for just .97 (reg. 8.99) through May 31. Mashable Deals By signing up, you agree to receive recurring automated SMS marketing messages from Mashable Deals at the number provided. Msg and data rates may apply. Up to 2 messages/day. Reply STOP to opt out, HELP for help. Consent is not a condition of purchase. See our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use. You’d be surprised what some fresh Microsoft tools and a new OS can do for your tried-and-true PC. This bundle can really spruce up an old device, starting with a mix of classic and new favorites in this Microsoft Office suite.Microsoft Office Professional 2021 equips your computer with a suite of eight helpful apps. Get old staples you’ve used for decades, like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook. Then see how new favorites like Teams, OneNote, Access, and Publisher can upgrade your workflow.You don’t only get new tools to work with — you get a whole new operating system thanks to Windows 11 Pro. This bundle includes an OS designed with modern professionals in mind, featuring a powerful search experience, improved voice typing, snap layouts, and more.If you haven’t been prioritizing your cybersecurity, you can rest easy knowing Windows 11 Pro amps things up. It offers biometric logins, encrypted authentication, and advanced antivirus defenses that can help keep your important data safe. Mashable Deals By signing up, you agree to receive recurring automated SMS marketing messages from Mashable Deals at the number provided. Msg and data rates may apply. Up to 2 messages/day. Reply STOP to opt out, HELP for help. Consent is not a condition of purchase. See our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use. Take advantage of this deal on an Ultimate Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for Windows Lifetime License and Windows 11 Pro Bundle, on sale now for only .97 until May 31.StackSocial prices subject to change. #Modernize #Microsoft #bundle

Ultimate Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for Windows Lifetime License and Windows 11 Pro Bundle, on sale now for just $34.97 (reg. $418.99) through May 31.

$34.97
$418.99 Save $384.02

 

If you don’t have hundreds of dollars lying around for a brand new laptop, don’t worry. The Ultimate Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for Windows Lifetime License and Windows 11 Pro Bundle gives you the next best thing — fresh tools and an updated operating system to make your old PC feel shiny and new (to you).

The even better news is that you can get it all for just $34.97 (reg. $418.99) through May 31.

Mashable Deals

By signing up, you agree to receive recurring automated SMS marketing messages from Mashable Deals at the number provided. Msg and data rates may apply. Up to 2 messages/day. Reply STOP to opt out, HELP for help. Consent is not a condition of purchase. See our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

You’d be surprised what some fresh Microsoft tools and a new OS can do for your tried-and-true PC. This bundle can really spruce up an old device, starting with a mix of classic and new favorites in this Microsoft Office suite.

Microsoft Office Professional 2021 equips your computer with a suite of eight helpful apps. Get old staples you’ve used for decades, like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook. Then see how new favorites like Teams, OneNote, Access, and Publisher can upgrade your workflow.

You don’t only get new tools to work with — you get a whole new operating system thanks to Windows 11 Pro. This bundle includes an OS designed with modern professionals in mind, featuring a powerful search experience, improved voice typing, snap layouts, and more.

If you haven’t been prioritizing your cybersecurity, you can rest easy knowing Windows 11 Pro amps things up. It offers biometric logins, encrypted authentication, and advanced antivirus defenses that can help keep your important data safe.

Take advantage of this deal on an Ultimate Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for Windows Lifetime License and Windows 11 Pro Bundle, on sale now for only $34.97 until May 31.

StackSocial prices subject to change.

#Modernize #Microsoft #bundle">Modernize your PC for just $35 with this Microsoft bundle

TL;DR: Give your PC a total refresh with the Ultimate Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for Windows Lifetime License and Windows 11 Pro Bundle, on sale now for just $34.97 (reg. $418.99) through May 31.

$34.97
$418.99 Save $384.02

 

If you don’t have hundreds of dollars lying around for a brand new laptop, don’t worry. The Ultimate Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for Windows Lifetime License and Windows 11 Pro Bundle gives you the next best thing — fresh tools and an updated operating system to make your old PC feel shiny and new (to you).

The even better news is that you can get it all for just $34.97 (reg. $418.99) through May 31.

Mashable Deals

By signing up, you agree to receive recurring automated SMS marketing messages from Mashable Deals at the number provided. Msg and data rates may apply. Up to 2 messages/day. Reply STOP to opt out, HELP for help. Consent is not a condition of purchase. See our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

You’d be surprised what some fresh Microsoft tools and a new OS can do for your tried-and-true PC. This bundle can really spruce up an old device, starting with a mix of classic and new favorites in this Microsoft Office suite.

Microsoft Office Professional 2021 equips your computer with a suite of eight helpful apps. Get old staples you’ve used for decades, like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook. Then see how new favorites like Teams, OneNote, Access, and Publisher can upgrade your workflow.

You don’t only get new tools to work with — you get a whole new operating system thanks to Windows 11 Pro. This bundle includes an OS designed with modern professionals in mind, featuring a powerful search experience, improved voice typing, snap layouts, and more.

If you haven’t been prioritizing your cybersecurity, you can rest easy knowing Windows 11 Pro amps things up. It offers biometric logins, encrypted authentication, and advanced antivirus defenses that can help keep your important data safe.

Take advantage of this deal on an Ultimate Microsoft Office Professional 2021 for Windows Lifetime License and Windows 11 Pro Bundle, on sale now for only $34.97 until May 31.

StackSocial prices subject to change.

#Modernize #Microsoft #bundle

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