Welcome back to, TIME's new twice-weekly newsletter about AI. If you're reading this in your browser, why not subscribe to have the next one delivered straight to your inbox? What to Know: Musk v. Altman Two artificial intelligence heavyweights will face off in court this spring, in a case that could have far-reaching outcomes for the future of AI. A judge ruled on Thursday that Elon Musk's lawsuit against Sam Altman, Microsoft, and other OpenAI co-founders can proceed to a jury trial, dismissing OpenAI's attempts to get the case thrown out. The lawsuit relates to the early days of OpenAI, which started as a nonprofit that was funded by around $38 million in donations from Musk.

Booth is a reporter at TIME. Booth is a reporter at TIME. Jimmy Wales describes himself as a "pathological optimist." And yet, when the co-founder of Wikipedia spoke with TIME in October, he still seemed somewhat surprised that his online encyclopedia actually worked. "Wikipedia is very trusting, in a way that always seemed a bit crazy," Wales says.

Open AI CEO Sam Altman speaks during a summit on June 2, 2025 in San Francisco, California. Open AI CEO Sam Altman speaks during a summit on June 2, 2025 in San Francisco, California. Founded in 2015 as a nonprofit, rather than a for-profit company, it promised to develop AI "in the way that is most likely to benefit humanity." With billions of dollars in investments from Microsoft, Japanese bank SoftBank, and chipmaker Nvidia, however, OpenAI has proposed changing its corporate structure to give investors more control over its technology. Critics of the change include cofounder-turned-competitor, Elon Musk, and nonprofits concerned about OpenAI's adherence to its mission.

The tussles between billionaires have seen vast fortunes splashed on everything from rocket ships to social media empires. But now, two titans of big tech are taking their fight to a frontier: The race to link our brains with AI. Tesla and xAI CEO Elon Musk and Sam Altman of OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, are vying to be the first to connect mind and machine. The former allies are now both backing rival companies trying to build brain-computer-interface (BCI) chips and put them inside humans. These devices allow people to directly control computers with their thoughts by reading the electrical signals produced in the brain. As outspoken champions of the technology, both Mr Musk and Mr Altman claim that BCIs will one day allow humanity to merge with artificial intelligence.

A long-running feud between Elon Musk and Sam Altman spilled out into the open this week as the AI billionaire heavyweights publicly fought over their rival companies. The latest round in the battle between the X CEO and the CEO of OpenAI began when Musk claimed that Apple had been favoring Altman's AI app over his own in the Apple Store rankings. "Apple is behaving in a manner that makes it impossible for any AI company besides OpenAI to reach #1 in the App Store, which is an unequivocal antitrust violation," Musk said on X on Monday evening. "xAI will take immediate legal action," he added, referring to the AI company he leads. "Hey @Apple App Store, why do you refuse to put either X or Grok in your'Must Have' section when X is the #1 news app in the world and Grok is #5 among all apps?" he asked.

The relationship between Sam Altman and Elon Musk goes back to the early days of OpenAI--then, a non-profit research lab. But now, the two men find themselves in a very public feud over the billion dollar AI company. Today on the show, we catalogue their friendship-turned-feud and how the company that started it all still remains core to their beef. Write to us at uncannyvalley@wired.com. You can always listen to this week's podcast through the audio player on this page, but if you want to subscribe for free to get every episode, here's how: If you're on an iPhone or iPad, open the app called Podcasts, or just tap this link.

Two of Silicon Valley's most prominent tech titans, Elon Musk and his former protégé Sam Altman, are in the middle of a very public feud over the future of OpenAI, the company behind the groundbreaking ChatGPT. Musk – the world's richest man and CEO of Tesla and SpaceX – has filed multiple lawsuits over the past year to stop Altman from restructuring OpenAI from a hybridised nonprofit into a for-profit company. Earlier this week, Musk raised the stakes by offering to buy the nonprofit for 97.4bn to preserve the original mission of the AI research lab – ensuring that "artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity". Musk's proposal was quickly rebuffed by Altman. In the latest development, Musk said through his lawyers on Wednesday that he would drop his offer if OpenAI remains a nonprofit, which would prevent the company from accessing potentially billions of dollars in funding.

Elon Musk last week sued two of his OpenAI cofounders, Sam Altman and Greg Brockman, accusing them of "flagrant breaches" of the trio's original agreement that the company would develop artificial intelligence openly and without chasing profits. Late on Tuesday, OpenAI released partially redacted emails between Musk, Altman, Brockman, and others that provide a counternarrative. The emails suggest that Musk was open to OpenAI becoming more profit-focused relatively early on, potentially undermining his own claim that it deviated from its original mission. In one message Musk offers to fold OpenAI into his electric-car company Tesla to provide more resources, an idea originally suggested by an email he forwarded from an unnamed outside party. The newly published emails also imply that Musk was not dogmatic about OpenAI having to freely provide its developments to all.