Elizabeth Lopatto, reporting for The Verge (gift link):
Today was closing arguments in the Musk v. Altman trial, and I
almost feel bad writing about the unbelievable demolition derby I
just witnessed. Steven Molo, Musk’s lawyer, stumbled over his
words. He at one point called Greg Brockman — a co-defendant — Greg Altman. He erroneously claimed that Musk wasn’t asking for
money and had to be corrected by the judge. He made it clear we’ve
heard from many liars over the past few weeks, but offered little
evidence for Musk’s actual legal claims.OpenAI’s lawyer, Sarah Eddy, countered this by simply arranging
the mountain of evidence that the company introduced in
chronological order. She didn’t spend time trying to pretend
anyone in this trial is especially reliable. She did, however, get
the zinger of the day, about Musk: “Even the mother of his
children can’t back his story.” William Savitt, who took the
defendant baton after her presentation, demonstrated the number of
times Musk “didn’t recall” some critical detail — and wondered
how a sophisticated businessman couldn’t understand or read a
four-page term sheet OpenAI had sent to him.I found myself wondering, again, why we were all wasting our time
here. So let’s discuss the gossip, which is the real point of this
trial. How good was it? Here are my favorite nuggets.
