Sam Altman rejects Musk's "stolen charity" claims in court showdown

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman's first turn on the witness stand Tuesday sharpened the central fight in Elon Musk's lawsuit: whether either man can be trusted to put AI safety ahead of money and control . Why it matters: The testimony showed how hard it is for any AI leader to claim the moral high ground. Driving the news : Altman rejected Musk's central claim that OpenAI and Microsoft had effectively tried to "steal a charity." "It feels difficult to even wrap my head around that framing," Altman said. He argued that shifting to a for-profit structure was the only way to raise the amount of money needed to develop safe and powerful artificial intelligence. Earlier in the trial, Musk offered a competing narrative, casting himself as the defender of OpenAI's original safety mission. Altman testified that Musk wanted to profit from OpenAI and also to control it, citing Musk's early push for a controlling stake or a merger with Tesla. Altman also said Musk wanted that control to pass to his childr