Elon Musk wanted total control of OpenAI to turn it around.
Mostly true True in substance, wrong in a detail.
Factual: Statements about the present or the past, checked against the record: did they hold up?
Said for an organisation they lead or work for; it counts on both records.
What would count as true or false
Judged as of 2024-03-18, using documentary evidence of Musk's position during his involvement with OpenAI (c. 2017–2018). True if contemporaneous emails, court filings or credible reporting show that Musk sought full or majority control of OpenAI (e.g., majority equity, board control, CEO role, or folding it into Tesla), and that he gave fixing or rescuing OpenAI's lagging position as the reason. Mostly true if Musk clearly sought majority or decisive control but the evidence shows it was something less than 'total' control, or the 'turn it around' reason is only partly documented. Mixed if the evidence is contested, e.g., Musk sought significant control but credible sources dispute that he sought total control or dispute his stated reason. Mostly false if Musk only sought a limited role or influence and the claim overstates it. False if the evidence shows Musk did not seek control of OpenAI.
Set before the research began.
Evidence (4)
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E1 The secret history of Elon Musk, Sam Altman, and OpenAI Semafor · 24 March 2023
“And Musk proposed a possible solution: He would take control of OpenAI and run it himself.”
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E2 Elon Musk tried to merge Tesla and OpenAI, emails reveal Electrek · 6 March 2024
“In late 2017, we and Elon decided the next step for the mission was to create a for-profit entity. Elon wanted majority equity, initial board control, and to be CEO.”
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E3 Elon Musk wanted an OpenAI for-profit OpenAI · 13 December 2024 Own record
“OpenAI is on a path of certain failure relative to Google. There obviously needs to be immediate and dramatic action or everyone except for Google will be consigned to irrelevance.”
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E4 The secret history of Elon Musk, Sam Altman, and OpenAI Semafor · 24 March 2023
“Publicly, he and OpenAI said the reason for his departure was a conflict of interest.”
Reasoning
Semafor's reporting [E1] says Musk proposed, as a possible solution, taking control of OpenAI and running it himself. Material quoted by Electrek [E2] says Musk wanted majority equity, initial board control and the CEO role. A passage published by OpenAI [E3] says OpenAI was "on a path of certain failure relative to Google" and needed "immediate and dramatic action"; the quoted text does not show who wrote it, so it bears only indirectly on the "turn it around" reason. Together these show Musk sought majority, decisive control rather than literally total control, so the claim fits "mostly true" under the criteria.
Cite this claim
Sam Altman, “Elon Musk wanted total control of OpenAI to turn it around.” (said 18 March 2024). Verdict: mostly true. Reliability API, claim c_42829ffe600a, method 0.1.0+c876030c, dataset release v1.1.2. https://epistacklabs.com/claims/c_42829ffe600a
This claim is in dataset release v1.1.2, with the same verdict.
Reply to this claim
More factual claims by Sam Altman
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Mostly true
“The very end of 2015, we announced it, and then the first day of work was like January of 2016.”
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Resolved true
“I was always an AI nerd. I was a real sci-fi nerd as a kid.”
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Mostly true
“he later decided that we weren’t on a trajectory to be successful and he didn’t want to.”
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Resolved true
“He helped us start OpenAI.”
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Resolved true
“When we started, it was four and a half years before we had our first product and it was very uncertain.”
When OpenAI started, it took four and a half years before it had its first product.
Verdicts are made automatically; how verdicts are made.