Deadpan phrasing..

SF tech CEO sums up Elon Musk with wonderfully deadpan phrasing

OpenAI head Sam Altman gave a one-on-one interview to Bloomberg

By Stephen Council

For an increasingly large swath of technology and politics, Elon Musk is the uber-powerful elephant in the room. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is a rare person with the tech-industry clout to speak on Musk’s antics — and thwart his aims. But in a new interview with Bloomberg, the San Francisco executive instead opted for the verbal equivalent of a shrug about Musk’s political ascension.

The wide-ranging conversation, between Altman and longtime journalist Josh Tyrangiel, was published by Bloomberg’s Businessweek on Sunday. Altman appeared earnest, delivering long and thoughtful answers to questions about OpenAI’s release of ChatGPT, his newfound fame and his brief firing in November 2023. He admitted to mistakes and candidly talked through personal struggles. 

When asked about Musk, though, Altman opted for a combination of nihilism and glibness. Tyrangiel referenced a comment Altman had made in December, with the OpenAI CEO positing that Musk would “do the right thing” and avoid using political power to hurt competitors. (Musk co-founded OpenAI with Altman but has since sued the nonprofit-corporate hybrid and launched a competing startup, xAI.) Tyrangiel then pushed back, pointing to Musk’s topsy-turvy purchase of Twitter, replatforming of Alex Jones, and proposal of a cage match with Mark Zuckerberg as the “tip of the funny-business iceberg.”

Altman jumped in: “Oh, I think he’ll do all sorts of bad s---. I think he’ll continue to sue us and drop lawsuits and make new lawsuits and whatever else.” He then said that the Zuckerberg challenge appeared to have been a joke.

“As you pointed out, he says a lot of things, starts them, undoes them, gets sued, sues, gets in fights with the government, gets investigated by the government,” Altman continued. “That’s just Elon being Elon.”

“Elon being Elon”: It rolls off the tongue and perfectly captures the insuperable heights the Tesla CEO and SpaceX founder seems to have reached in Silicon Valley and now in Washington. Never mind the daily barrage of misinformation Musk spouts on X to tens of millions of viewers; his influence has never been greater. Never mind his laundry list of legal troubles and rising electric vehicle competition; Tesla’s stock price hit an all-time high in December. Altman’s role heading OpenAI sounds, by his account, exhausting; the $50 billion-valuation xAI is practically a side hustle for Musk. 

Altman added that he “genuinely” doesn’t think Musk will “mess with a business competitor” but admitted he “may turn out to be proven wrong.” 

Near the end of the interview, Tyrangiel tried a different tack, trying to get Altman to open up about Musk’s seemingly limitless ability to pull in cash. He asked if the executive was surprised by Musk’s capital-raising for xAI, specifically from Oman, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

“No,” Altman answered. “No. They have a lot of capital. It’s the industry people want. Elon is Elon.”