More cynical take based on the Musk/Altman emails: Altman was expecting Musk to be CEO. He set up a governance structure which would effectively be able to dethrone Musk, with him as the obvious successor, and was happy to staff the board with ideological people who might well take issue with something Musk did down the line to give him a shot at the throne.
Musk walked away, and it would’ve been too weird to change his mind on the governance structure. Altman thought this trap wouldn’t fire with high enough probability to disarm it at any time before it did.
I don’t know whether the dates line up to dis-confirm this, but I could see this kind of 5d chess move happening. Though maybe normal power and incentive psychological things are sufficient.
More cynical take based on the Musk/Altman emails: Altman was expecting Musk to be CEO. He set up a governance structure which would effectively be able to dethrone Musk, with him as the obvious successor, and was happy to staff the board with ideological people who might well take issue with something Musk did down the line to give him a shot at the throne.
Musk walked away, and it would’ve been too weird to change his mind on the governance structure. Altman thought this trap wouldn’t fire with high enough probability to disarm it at any time before it did.
I don’t know whether the dates line up to dis-confirm this, but I could see this kind of 5d chess move happening. Though maybe normal power and incentive psychological things are sufficient.