Welp, it looks like OpenAI—the brains behind ChatGPT—is done pretending to be the altruistic AI hero it once claimed to be. Remember when they were all about that nonprofit life back in 2015? Yeah, not so much anymore. 💸
The Money Game
Fast forward a few billion-dollar investments later, and Financial Times is reporting that OpenAI’s looking to drop its nonprofit status for good. This could boost its value to over $100 billion—making it one of the most valuable Silicon Valley companies. But don’t get too excited just yet. 🤑
OpenAI shot back, saying, “Nah, the nonprofit core is still our vibe. We’re just trying to make AI work for everyone.” Sure… if “everyone” means Microsoft and some deep-pocketed investors. 👀
Elon’s Beef 🥩
ICYMI, Elon Musk has had some serious feelings about all this. He quit OpenAI back in 2019 and now accuses them of ditching their “benefit humanity” mission for profit. Oh, and he sued them last month (again), arguing they sold out to Microsoft with that $10 billion deal. Funny thing though—emails from when Musk first bailed show he was the one pushing OpenAI to go for-profit in the first place. 🤔 Talk about irony.
Capped Profits? No Cap 🤷
So what’s next? OpenAI hasn’t made a final decision yet, but removing profit caps for investors is definitely on the table, which would basically be the final goodbye to its nonprofit roots. Sam Altman and crew have already raised insane amounts of cash, so why not go all the way, right?
At this point, calling OpenAI a nonprofit is like saying crypto is “totally safe.” Not fooling anyone. 🤷♀️