Elon Musk's lawsuit regarding OpenAI's technology openness strategy
Haebom
Elon Musk has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and five others. Although he was a co-founder of OpenAI, Musk has now completely stepped away, yet he is criticizing the founding principles established with Sam Altman at the time they started OpenAI together, as well as the principle of good faith. To put it simply, it's like calling it an 'Open' church, but the doors are closed.
Key issues of the lawsuit
The main reason Elon Musk filed the lawsuit against OpenAI is that OpenAI is using artificial intelligence (AI) technology for profit, which he claims is clearly contrary to OpenAI's founding principles. The complaint specifically points out that the GPT-4 model is completely closed, appearing to violate the original spirit of 'open AI' that OpenAI pursued at the start. It is also noted that Microsoft is commercially exploiting this model, expecting to generate considerable profits as a result.
In the document on the left, researchers point out some limitations of the GPT architecture. For instance, the GPT architecture can only produce one output at a time and doesn't allow for 'backtracking'. However, AI research has addressed such issues for a long time, and applications like maze-solving require the ability to find the right path. The article also mentions Reuters reporting that OpenAI is developing a secret algorithm called Q*. This algorithm apparently goes beyond the scope of Microsoft's license and is argued to be artificial general intelligence (AGI), which should be made available to the public for everyone's benefit.
So, what exactly does Elon Musk want?
According to the complaint, these seem to be the things Elon Musk wants:
These demands are aimed at ensuring that OpenAI adheres to the goals and values it pledged at its founding, emphasizing the openness and non-profit nature of AI technology. Elon claims that OpenAI has strayed from these principles by serving the interests of corporations like Microsoft, and so the demands above include seeking both a legal ruling and related financial compensation.
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A. Specifically ordering the defendant to fulfill their contractual promises.
i. An order requiring OpenAI to continue its long-standing practice of releasing AI research and technology to the public.
ii. An order prohibiting the defendant from using OpenAI, Inc. or its assets for personal gain or for the financial benefit of Microsoft or any particular individual or organization.
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B. A legal ruling that GPT-4 qualifies as artificial general intelligence (AGI) and is outside OpenAI’s licensing scope to Microsoft.
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C. Legal determination that Q* and/or other next-generation language models from OpenAI constitute AGI and are not covered by OpenAI’s license to Microsoft.
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D. An injunction to effectively enforce the provisions in A through C above.
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E. Compensation, including the return and forfeiture of all profits the defendant received while engaging in unfair and improper practices.
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F. Accounting for funds donated by the plaintiff and others to OpenAI, Inc., and for the use of intellectual property or derivative works supported by those funds.
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G. A judgment awarding general, actual, and punitive damages (all to be shown at trial).
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H. Attorney's fees pursuant to California civil procedure.
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I. Pre- and post-judgment interest at the statutory maximum rate.
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J. Any further relief the court finds appropriate.
It really does have that “Musk” vibe to it, and since it's tied to the online meme 'ClosedAI', it's hard to say who's definitely right here. From Elon Musk's perspective, he's probably trying to get OpenAI to publish models, as he did with DALLE-2 and GPT-3—the same way he released hundreds of EV-related patents and tech in the past, which helped the electric car market take off. (Besides, that would be good for XAI too...)
This lawsuit alleges breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, and unfair business practices, aiming to force OpenAI to honor its founding agreement and develop AGI for the benefit of humanity. It may also have an impact on ongoing investigations by competition authorities in the US, EU, and UK into the legality of the deal between Microsoft and OpenAI.
Back in 2015, Musk proposed establishing OpenAI as a non-profit AI research institute, opposite to Google's closed approach, that would run open source and provide technology for free for the benefit of humanity. That's how OpenAI came to be. However, when OpenAI released GPT-4 in 2023, it significantly deviated from these principles. Apart from a technical report (performance chart), it hasn't revealed anything about how the model was built or the research methods used.
Recently, this criticism has gotten even louder, with Google open-sourcing Gemma and Meta open-sourcing LLaMA.
No matter how this lawsuit turns out, it seems likely to have a big impact.
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여러가지 이해관계가 있겠지만 OpenAI 내부 구성원들이 바라보는 점도 이러한 노선에 영향을 끼치고 있을 것 이라 생각이되네요.
그리고 일론머스크는.. 정말.. 저러한 행동원칙에 대한 심리가 정말 순수적 공익성을 위한거라면 대단한 사람같습니다.