He’s definitely given some money, and I don’t think the 990 absence means much. From here:
in 2016, the IRS was still processing OpenAI’s non-profit status, making it impossible for the organization to receive charitable donations. Instead, the Musk Foundation gave $10m to another young charity, YC.org. [...] The Musk Foundation’s grant accounted for the majority of YC.org’s revenue, and almost all of its own funding, when it passed along $10m to OpenAI later that year.
Also, when he quit in 2018, OpenAI wrote “Elon Musk will depart the OpenAI Board but will continue to donate and advise the organization”. The same blog post lists multiple other donors than Sam Altman, so donating to OpenAI without showing up on the 990s must be the default, for some reason.
That’s interesting. I did see YC listed as a major funding source, but given Sam Altman’s listed loans/donations, I assumed, because YC has little or nothing to do with Musk, that YC’s interest was Altman, Paul Graham, or just YC collectively. I hadn’t seen anything at all about YC being used as a cutout for Musk. So assuming the Guardian didn’t screw up its understanding of the finances there completely (the media is constantly making mistakes in reporting on finances and charities in particular, but this seems pretty detailed and specific and hard to get wrong), I agree that that confirms Musk did donate money to get OA started and it was a meaningful sum.
But it still does not seem that Musk donated the majority or even plurality of OA donations, much less the $1b constantly quoted (or any large fraction of the $1b collective pledge, per ESRogs).
He’s definitely given some money, and I don’t think the 990 absence means much. From here:
Also, when he quit in 2018, OpenAI wrote “Elon Musk will depart the OpenAI Board but will continue to donate and advise the organization”. The same blog post lists multiple other donors than Sam Altman, so donating to OpenAI without showing up on the 990s must be the default, for some reason.
That’s interesting. I did see YC listed as a major funding source, but given Sam Altman’s listed loans/donations, I assumed, because YC has little or nothing to do with Musk, that YC’s interest was Altman, Paul Graham, or just YC collectively. I hadn’t seen anything at all about YC being used as a cutout for Musk. So assuming the Guardian didn’t screw up its understanding of the finances there completely (the media is constantly making mistakes in reporting on finances and charities in particular, but this seems pretty detailed and specific and hard to get wrong), I agree that that confirms Musk did donate money to get OA started and it was a meaningful sum.
But it still does not seem that Musk donated the majority or even plurality of OA donations, much less the $1b constantly quoted (or any large fraction of the $1b collective pledge, per ESRogs).