Shivon Zilis, mother of Elon Musk’s children, testifies in lawsuit against OpenAI
TL;DR
Zilis, an executive at Musk’s brain implant startup Neuralink, served on OpenAI’s board from 2020 to 2023 Shivon Zilis, a Neuralink executive and the mother of four of Elon Musk’s children, took the stand on Wednesday as one of the most highly anticipated witnesses in Musk’s case against OpenAI. The ChatGPT maker has argued that, while Zilis worked with OpenAI between 2016 and 2023, she was also involved in a secret relationship with Musk, acting as an informant for him.
Nauti's Take
The trial gives rare insight into OpenAI's early-stage inner workings — discovery like this is genuinely useful for the industry and for researchers studying governance. The hard limit: personal relationships and evidence motions are no basis for evaluating models; anyone deriving product decisions from this is mixing gossip with substance.
The real signal is whether the verdict reshapes profit restructurings at other labs.
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