'Elon Musk knows cars, knows rockets but is clueless about AI': OpenAI exec tells court on Day 6 of trial

Greg Brockman defended his personal journal in court, recounted tensions with Elon Musk, and addressed OpenAI's structural shift amid an ongoing legal battle.

In Short

• Brockman defends journal as raw, personal, and misinterpreted notes
• Testimony reveals tensions with Musk over control and funding
• Microsoft distances itself from OpenAI’s founding and structural decisions

Greg Brockman, president of OpenAI, was back on the witness stand today and sought to reframe diary entries that Elon Musk’s lawyers had used the previous day to portray him as a calculating opportunist. In his defence, Brockman said the journal wasn’t neatly written—it was more like raw, unfiltered thoughts written as they came to mind. Because of that, the notes could be messy and even contradict each other at times.

The journal entry about “Ilya feeling like we morally should not be kicking Elon out, and should be trying to make the non-profit work” as well as “it’d be wrong to steal the non-profit from him,” Brockman clarified, was directly connected to their choice not to remove Musk from the board. In essence, they believed keeping him was the right decision for the organisation’s mission, even though on a personal level the situation felt uncomfortable and conflicted.

“Look, he knows rockets. He knows electric cars. He did not and does not know AI. And Ilya and I did not believe he would spend the time to get good at it,” Brockman said.

Brockman also tried to explain other entries from the journal, such as “making the money for us sounds great and all,” saying it was about unsuccessful fundraising, but the court to decide what is true.

“It’s very painful” to see the journal in this case, Brockman said. These were “very deeply personal writings that were never meant for the world to see, but there’s nothing there I’m ashamed of,” he added.

“I truly thought he was going to physically attack me,” Brockman said

During his testimony, Brockman also described a tense and confrontational moment between him and Musk. He said Musk was so angry during a meeting that he genuinely feared Musk might physically attack him.

“I truly thought he was going to physically attack me,” Brockman said.

The anger came from a disagreement over Musk wanting majority control (equity) in OpenAI, but others refused to agree. Brockman said Musk escalated the situation by saying he would stop funding OpenAI until they made a decision about their future. After that, he followed through by halting his promised regular donations.

Concerns around Shivon Zilis and transparency

Brockman also discussed concerns around transparency, trust, and potential conflicts of interest involving Shivon Zilis and Musk during her time connected to OpenAI. He said that Zilis did not tell him about her romantic relationship with Musk. While she was still on OpenAI’s board, she had twins, and Brockman reportedly learned through public reporting that Musk was the father.

Later, Zilis said the twins were conceived via IVF and described her relationship with Musk as “entirely platonic,” suggesting she framed it as non-romantic despite the earlier concern.

‘The Blip’: Leadership crisis at OpenAI

Describing the chaotic period often referred to as “the blip,” the leadership crisis at OpenAI, Brockman said he was informed in a very short eight-minute call that he had been removed from the board, but was not told why. During the same conversation, he also learned that Sam Altman had been fired.

Because of how sudden and unclear the decisions were, Brockman felt the board had handled the situation badly—both in judgment and execution.

Microsoft distances itself

Microsoft’s lawyers also questioned Brockman in court. However, their overall stance has been consistent from the beginning: they want to stay out of the conflict and not be seen as responsible for what happened.

That’s why most of their questions are very specific and defensive, such as whether Microsoft had any role in founding OpenAI or in creating its for-profit structure. The goal is to establish on record that Microsoft was not involved in those key decisions and therefore should not be blamed or held accountable.

The core legal fight

At the center of the case is the legal fight between Musk and Altman over how OpenAI changed its structure. Musk claims OpenAI was originally set up as a non-profit meant to benefit the public, almost like a charitable mission. He argues that when it later moved toward a for-profit model, the people running it broke that original promise—a “charitable trust”—and unjustly enriched themselves.

On the other side, OpenAI’s leadership, including Altman, rejects this. Their defense is that the shift to a for-profit structure was not done to make themselves rich, but to raise the huge amounts of funding needed to build advanced AI. In other words, they say the change was about practicality and scaling the mission, not personal gain.

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