Elon Musk has taken the stand at a high-stakes trial over the future of OpenAI, casting his lawsuit against the ChatGPT maker as a defence of charitable giving.The world’s richest person is suing OpenAI, its cofounder and chief executive officer, Sam Altman, and its president, Greg Brockman, and said on the stand on Tuesday that they betrayed him and the public by abandoning OpenAI’s mission to be a benevolent steward of AI for humanity and transforming the nonprofit into a profit-seeking juggernaut.Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list“If we make it OK to loot a charity, the entire foundation of charitable giving in America will be destroyed,” Musk testified on the first day of the trial. “That’s my concern.”Musk, who founded carmaker Tesla and rocket company SpaceX, also said he is committed to serving the public by working 80- to 100-hour weeks and generally not taking vacations. “I like working and solving problems that make people’s lives better,” he said.Before Musk began testifying, Bill Savitt, a lawyer for OpenAI and Altman, told jurors during his opening statement it was Musk who saw dollar signs as he helped finance OpenAI’s early growth and pushed it to become a for-profit business, one he might eventually lead as CEO.Savitt said Musk wanted “the keys to the kingdom” and sued only after he failed, and then in 2023 started his own AI business, xAI, now part of SpaceX.“What he cares about is Elon Musk being on top,” Savitt said in his opening statement. “We are here because M …
