'AI in hands of ruthless corporate': Elon Musk says Microsoft has exclusive access to OpenAI codebase

Elon Musk on Friday took to Twitter to confirm that as a part of Microsoft's investment in AI research body OpenAI, the company has access to all of the codebase.

OpenAI is the parent company of recent internet AI sensation, ChatGPT. The chatbot set off a race among the big tech including Microsoft and Google.

Musk also took a jab at Microsoft with a meme.

I’m sure it will be fine pic.twitter.com/JWsq62Qkru

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 24, 2023

In January, it was reported that Microsoft has invested over $10 billion in OpenAI. However, the status of OpenAI was always termed as a non-profit research body.

Musk, in his reply to a user on Twitter, has now also confirmed that OpenAI is not a non-profit anymore and that it's not an open-source model either anymore.

Good question. It somehow transitioned from an open source non-profit to a closed source for-profit.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 24, 2023

Musk tweeted," ChatGPT is entirely housed within Microsoft Azure. When push comes to shove, they have everything, including the model weights."

ChatGPT is entirely housed within Microsoft Azure. When push comes to shove, they have everything, including the model weights.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 24, 2023

Musk's connection with OpenAI

Musk was one of the early supporters of OpenAI. He invested $100 million in the company when it was set up in 2015 by its current chief executive Sam Altman. However, Musk in another tweet clarified that he has no control or ownership over OpenAI whatsoever.

I donated the first $100M to OpenAI when it was a non-profit, but have no ownership or control

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 24, 2023

This comes the same day OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announced new plugins for the chatbot, that make it more effective and helpful. To build these plugins, OpenAI has invited select plugin developers off the waitlist, and they can use OpenAI's documentation to start creating ChatGPT plugins. The first batch of plugins has already been created by a range of companies, including Expedia, FiscalNote, Instacart, KAYAK, Klarna, Milo, OpenTable, Shopify, Slack, Speak, Wolfram, and Zapier.

 

Read: ChatGPT gets 'eyes and ears'! OpenAI CEO Sam Altman introduces ChatGPT Plug-ins; see how they work

we are starting our rollout of ChatGPT plugins.

you can install plugins to help with a wide variety of tasks. we are excited to see what developers create!https://t.co/NQ684Yp2LK pic.twitter.com/m7b6vJrj5D

— Sam Altman (@sama) March 23, 2023