In short
A behind-the-scenes look at the OpenAI vs. Elon Musk courtroom proceedings, focusing on how press access works, what jury selection reveals, Judge Rogers’ courtroom style, and how each side frames the case (humanity/doom vs. facts/hypocrisy). It also covers upcoming witnesses and the strategic “theater” of a jury trial.
Guests
Mike Isaac (New York Times tech reporter covering major tech litigation; previously covered Apple v. Samsung, Meta/FTC matters, and other high-profile cases; has been nearly kicked out for tweeting and for wearing Meta Ray-Bans). Cade Metz is mentioned as a colleague.
Key claims
Judge Rogers is strict and comedic; jury “vibe” matters; public access draws Elon fans and concerned citizens; Elon’s testimony leans on existential “humanity” themes while OpenAI emphasizes Elon’s knowledge/for-profit hypocrisy and alleged misuse of OpenAI tech (including “distillation” framing).
Notable examples
reserved press seats and live blogging; a civilian berated for recording; prior coverage of Zuckerberg/Meta testimony; the “Terminators” analogy; upcoming witnesses like Stuart Russell and possible Sam Altman/Greg Brockman.
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Chapters
Tap a time to open that second in VOInsights from the Courtroom
0:45 to 2:55
Discussion about attending court and experiences related to press access.
“They can just get it and you're just out?”
Experiences with Court Cases
2:55 to 5:09
The guest shares past experiences covering notable court cases.
“So like, this is actually a very permissive judge just because she believes in like press access and stuff.”
Public Interest and Jury Dynamics
5:09 to 7:46
Exploration of public interest in the trial and jury dynamics.
“Like it actually is a lot of court cases are boring to people who don't care about this stuff, right?”
Judge Rogers and Courtroom Behavior
7:46 to 10:40
Insights into Judge Rogers' courtroom demeanor and behavior towards attendees.
“No, I think, so I do think they want, more often than not, want a jury of these CEOs and company peers to be the deciding factor in what they feel like is good for a civil claim.”
Elon's Trial Framing and Strategy
10:40 to 13:34
Discussion on how Elon Musk is positioning himself during the trial.
“And then, and that's like a very high level, you know, high concept pitch.”
Hypocrisy and Competitive Technology
13:34 to 14:02
Analysis of accusations against Elon Musk regarding competition and hypocrisy.
Elon Musk's Hypocrisy Explored
14:02 to 15:40
Examine the accusations against Elon Musk regarding his business practices and the use of OpenAI's technology.
“That's the game in the, you know, no holds capitalism land.”
Jury Dynamics and Potential Conflicts
15:40 to 19:00
Discuss the implications of jury behavior in high-stakes trials and the potential for self-interest influencing decisions.
“Because I was thinking we've now seen insider trading across every possible prediction market, right?”
Shifting Dynamics in Court Testimonies
19:00 to 21:30
Explore the changes in courtroom attitudes and strategies from Elon Musk and OpenAI's legal teams.
“And ultimately, it feels like the X slash Twitter acquisition has worked out pretty well for Elon.”
The Complexity of Witness Testimonies
21:30 to 26:19
Analyze the significance and potential consequences of witness testimonies in the ongoing trial, including strategic missteps.
“So I think it was like, here's the people behind the curtain.”
Show all 17 chapters
AI Safety Concerns and the Future
26:19 to 28:03
Delve into the contentious debates surrounding AI safety and how they relate to the trial and Elon Musk's objectives.
“So maybe it's a strategic misstep by Tobaroff, Elon's lawyer, but it's not quite clear yet.”
The AI Debate and Terminator Analogies
28:03 to 29:54
Explore the intense discussions around AI safety and cultural references to the Terminator.
“And like, how does that, how does that, like, can't this kind of witness potentially backfire in some capacity?”
Perception of AI in Society
29:54 to 31:08
Examine the negative public perception of AI and its implications for the industry.
Courtroom Dynamics and Public Relations
31:08 to 32:38
Discuss the courtroom experience around the AI trial and its potential media impact.
“Like, this is a perception problem in a lot of ways, which like, to me is funny because like, I, not that I'm smart, but I feel like I've known that for a little while.”
Voice Cloning Technology and Its Risks
32:38 to 33:51
Delve into the controversial aspects of voice cloning technology in AI.
“Would that be possible with enough resources?”
Legal Ramifications in Tech Industry
33:51 to 36:22
Analyze the implications of tech fines and their effectiveness on companies.
“I was thinking more of doing basically end of the day.”
Future of Coverage and Content Creation
36:22 to 38:13
Speculate on the potential for future storytelling around the trial and its coverage.
“We talked to a law professor who said like the question is, does social media exist in the future?”
Transcript
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.0:00TBPN:Let's bring him into the TBPN Ultra Dome. He's at the New York Times. Mike, how you doing?
0:05Mike Isaac:Yo, what's up? Good to see you. Great to see you. So, wait, so what's up with, yeah, so four-day work week? Are they living in the future?
0:14TBPN:Yeah. Is this universal basic vacation days? It's quarters incredible in that I got to sleep in till like 9 a.m. today, which is, which is great. But I made up for it because like literally every day this week, I've gotten up at 5 o 'clock in the morning. to get my cold ass down to the Oakland courthouse and stand outside for two hours. So I don't know, but it's fun.
0:37Mike Isaac:How does it work? Who gets priority? Is it first come, first serve? Like if some random person shows up before you?
0:47TBPN:They can just get it and you're just out?
0:49Mike Isaac:Or you get to show some sort of press. How does it work?
0:54TBPN:Yeah, I wish I was cool enough to cut. You should get an artist pass. VIP pass. Yeah, right.
1:01Mike Isaac:No, not VIP, artist pass. It's a level of love. Okay, artist pass.
1:06TBPN:So there are 20 reserved seats in the front row for press, but the issue is only one person per outlet gets it, and we are doing live blogging for the big moments, opening statements, and for Elon. and so myself and my colleague Cade came on the first the whole first week and so so we've had a trade-off he's gotten the like press skip the line thing and I've been with the other folks in the 30 unreserved seats in the back and that are watching YouTube videos yeah oh my god or striped sessions literally at one dude fell asleep I was actually impressed yeah it seemed pretty entertaining.
1:52Mike Isaac:It didn't seem like you were falling asleep. I was keeping up on the, through the live blog.
1:57TBPN:Be reading my nightmarish Twitter too. I, it's been fun, honestly. Have you guys ever done like court case things or have you ever been sued or been in court? I've never been in court. I went to a mock court in high school where everyone picks a role. I think I was, Yeah, we LARPed in court. Literally LARPing in high school. But other than that, never.
2:21Mike Isaac:This whole time, it seems insane. Like with the recent NASA, the moon mission, I was like, this should be a live stream plus a pay-per-view for the key moments for this trial. It's like we have huge budget deficits and we have these incredible media products. Why are we not doing pay-per-views, right? That's the funny thing.
2:43TBPN:I was just going to say that's the funny thing about like federal courthouse stuff. Like, there's a lot of different rules around filming and electronics. I covered some cases in DC, and I can't even bring a laptop or phone in those courthouses. So like, this is actually a very permissive judge just because she believes in like press access and stuff. And we've had way more access than you would normally get in federal court cases. Okay, so you've been to these court cases before, but if I follow your Twitter, it feels like you're making a bunch of rookie mistakes. You only had egg bites at 5 30 AM.
3:19TBPN:Your bite energy is wearing off. You forgot your butt pillow. You forgot to fill your water bottle. Like, is this amateur hour? Are you a professional? What's going on? I'd say, I think that you, you guys might know me well enough that that is kind of how I operate most of my life, like kind of chaotic, but it is focused on the important stuff. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, look, I can file. I may be like bleeding and hungry, like limping across the finish line. But we're getting I'm tweeting for you.
3:50Mike Isaac:What is your what is your what are some like high profile cases that that stand out that you've covered in the past?
3:58TBPN:So I got to do. Let's see. My first one was insanely boring, but important. the Apple versus Samsung thing back in the day and like them suing for Samsung copying like literally everything they do. I did Dallas. Actually, Zuckerberg's like, I think maybe one of his first testimonies on the stand when ZeniMax was suing Meta for the Oculus acquisition. Remember that? Yeah. That was in Dallas. That was super fun. That I almost got kicked out of the courtroom for tweeting. Whoa. and then I did the DC FTC meta one and I almost got kicked out of the courtroom again actually I did get kicked out of the courtroom for wearing the meta Ray-Bans these are not it but I wore the meta Ray-Bans and then they started putting I was fucking super stupid for doing it but then they started putting signs up saying do not wear these glasses
4:53Mike Isaac:but you were just using them as glasses or you were being sneaky and you were recording
4:58TBPN:no I was like look I can't record I won't record I was trying to play by the rules and like they were they are my prescription glasses yeah but the bailiff the bailiff was like it's too much it's too high risk for them because you could
5:10Mike Isaac:just because you could have like turned off the the light or whatever yeah uh talk about the the
5:15TBPN:fans are there really Elon Musk fans in the courtroom like what what motivates someone to go and watch that live is this their UFC front row ticket like why are they there uh so you guys would have fun. Like it actually is a lot of court cases are boring to people who don't care about this stuff, right? Like you and I may be super into like the FTC trial was super fun for me because it's like, oh my God, Mark Zuckerberg emailing Sheryl Sandberg and talking about path. Like this is incredible. And like the average person has no idea what we're talking about. But this is like a circus. There are people who genuinely love Elon or are genuinely worried about the end of the world happening um and i think it's a really good thing that there's public access to these courts like i think like the average person can come in and show up and that's what i think after the the buzz of twitter and like people seeing that this is a event we got a much longer lines and like folks who are local like just like i know a pm in tech from meta that came i know like a guy from box made it in uh just if you get a seat if you get there early enough and you can get a seat and you can just hang out it's like and i think it's really great i think it's great that people are yeah are there for it you know it shouldn't just be me yeah what about
6:37Mike Isaac:the what about the jury does the jury seem excited and honored to have the opportunity to be to be a part of of a case like this or are they are they nodding off it's gonna be so funny it'd be like so out of just like off the internet to make selection you can't be super biased you're
6:57TBPN:probably not a p.i.
6:58Mike Isaac:like sam this guy sam and greg and this guy who makes cars and i don't even know what they're talking about a whole bunch of mumbo jumbo like there's got to be one person on the jury that was just so not tapped in that that they're just confused i think jury selection
7:15TBPN:was super interesting for that i can't say it's actually interesting i can't say too much about the jury right now because like there's all these rules about oh sure like some random person could go up to them if you identify them or try to alter it totally but i will say like during jury selection on monday it is an incredible slice of life and you get like how familiar or unfamiliar people are with the tech industry despite being here you know like some folks are like i have no idea talking about i don't know what ai is i don't know what agi stands for so it really it really played and voir dire and jury selection is so important for cases like this just it makes the dynamic of the facts don't necessarily always matter but the vibe can really matter which i think is a benefit for elon honestly yeah were they were they trying to weed out they're trying
8:10Mike Isaac:to weed out people that are a little bit too excited about the case right you want the people letter like in order to have a uh but but then talk i i didn't understand why is the jury just like giving like an advisory decision what is the history of like why do you why do you have a jury when the judge is ultimately going to make the final call it feels like just kind of putting on like a show because like theoretically the judge could just sit through a bunch of depositions and make a call? Sure.
8:43TBPN:No, I think, so I do think they want, more often than not, want a jury of these CEOs and company peers to be the deciding factor in what they feel like is good for a civil claim. Like that, I think is fairly standard. But to your point, the judge can throw out their verdict, which is like, is, and judges, I don't think tend to want to do that because like they want to have reliance on this is the public the public should have a say in what goes or whatever but uh the judge can do that I will say also she is responsible for uh if they're if Elon or sorry if OpenAI is found liable judge decides on remedies damages and things like that so she still has an active role in that regard and in steering the case But I really do think that courts often prefer or often appreciate a peer, a jury of your peers making some of these decisions.
9:45TBPN:So I don't think it's going to be like completely disregarded is what I would say.
9:50Mike Isaac:How has Judge Rogers done so far in your view? Just reading the live blog, she seemingly has like zingers, pretty good one-liners. the time i'm just like kind of imagining what it's like in there because obviously i'm just reading text but she's had like seemingly like some pretty good comedic timing yeah oh my god she's so funny she's like real like as you might imagine there's like a number of different types
10:19TBPN:of judges and how they handle their court or whatever and she just takes no bs from anyone including the lawyers and like when they try to like tap dance or break the rules or whatever she's like no shut up or like get back on track or no no actually the best part or the most insane part so one woman in the overflow room who is just uh not just it was a civilian going to attend and watch it started recording which is again against the rules if not the law in a federal courthouse so the judge brings her in and in front of a room of like 100 people just like dresses her down yells at her saying did you not see any of these signs what are you doing i will kick you out i will it was like i i would have like peed my pants and started crying if she had done that to me it was deeply deeply intense it's it's teacher you know uh berating a student yeah classes in session classes in session here it was brutal uh how how how do you how have you been processing Elon's positioning, it feels like the two stories that I've heard him sort of telling are one about his commitment to technology, humanity, saving the world through Tesla and the electrification of the internal combustion engine and SpaceX making humanity multi-planetary.
11:46TBPN:And then, and that's like a very high level, you know, high concept pitch. And then he also sort of brings it down and starts beating this drum on like, you can't steal a charity. You can't steal a charity. Is that the correct framing that he's trying to go like high and low there? How much have he's been beating each of these drums and how useful is that? So I totally agree. that's the framing and i think this really goes to the point of a lot of these trials are pageantry is the wrong word but let's say theater in that you are this is a jury trial and it's a different thing than just convincing a judge who i would say is much more attuned to the facts and merit of the case and like hammering in on the evidence and like uh something that may be boring to you or me or whatever or the jury is going to be more important to a judge elon i think from day has leaned into the persona of Elon and just from him being on the stand and saying, I care about humanity.
12:48TBPN:I mean, he says he does whatever he does or doesn't. But like just leaning into this, like I'm a world changing entrepreneur and this stuff is existential and I'm the one who has cared about it. And like that may work on a jury, you know, like there are people who still love him. and you know open ai is really hammering the facts of what they feel are their side of the case and saying elon has known about uh elon has never been in the dark he quit in a huff he uh he's made it very clear he hasn't been there he's trying to sue now or he's trying to file this claim now because he's catching up because he's behind as an xai competitor but like again this is all stuff that maybe it doesn't play like this is why jury trials are so risky for companies a lot of the time you know it's really it's fun for me it's probably not fun for for everyone in there but it's fun to see it play out if that makes sense how did the distillation uh comments come up that was like that was the news of the day yesterday you guys obviously
13:51Mike Isaac:which you broke you you you broke it right i think i did yeah i think it was one of those things where
13:56TBPN:i was like holy this is news and i think like folks like started figuring it out but i was like gotta put it on twerk and uh uh so the point uh so bill sabbott is lead counsel for open ai he was sort of talking about the the point was made in the context of they want to hammer home elon is creating a competitive product and also he keeps stressing that this is doom world ending technology but at the same time he's he's he's ripping off the toss and using the technology to improve his own technology in an explicitly for-profit company and so the the point is like hammering him as a hypocrite and i think look like i think elon has history in his businesses it would not be controversial to say to like say one thing and do the other and i think he sees it There's like rules of engagement.
14:53TBPN:That's the game in the, you know, no holds capitalism land. But like that is how it came up. And that they didn't go super deep into it, but they wanted to make the point. He's using open eyes tech. He's breaking the toss and he's partly distilling it. And I want to say also that Elon went out of his way to say everyone kind of does this. It's like an open secret in the industry, which I think is like also kind of true. But that doesn't make it. There's like it's fraught, I guess, is what I would say. Yeah, yeah. There's obviously a continuum there, which is why he tried to hammer that it was like partly.
15:28TBPN:I imagine most car companies have taken a rival car for a spin. Have they taken the car apart? There's a line there and there are laws, but that's a separate issue, of course.
15:39Mike Isaac:Has anything come up with a jury around prediction markets? Because I was thinking we've now seen insider trading across every possible prediction market, right? from uh you know i'm sure from like very interesting you know even even the maduro thing was was was interesting because a lot of people were like oh he's just betting on himself but then i saw that i was like hey that's sending a signal to the entire world that an attack could be happening which puts your entire team at risk right so like very very clearly like u.s military personnel should not be able to trade against our own military's actions ever, right?
16:19Mike Isaac:And that they need to come down really hard on that. Are you just trading on this crazy?
16:25TBPN:Are you going to retire?
16:27Mike Isaac:The reason that the jury thing is bad is it creates a potentially an incentive for the jury to basically work together and say like, hey, like we all have to be here for like a month like we could at least make some money on it and then you only need to get like four you only need to get like four or five of these people the chat is saying monetized jury duty oh my god no but but like it seems like very important that this does not happen right because because there's very pot like they they tried to select a jury that just doesn't care about the ai race they don't care about this or that and and but if they are self-interested in some capacity they could be like well my my decision is not is not even really legally binding it's just advisory like i may as well you know i don't know right uh i i think that's a great
17:21TBPN:point and like something that i imagine like court systems aren't even prepared for fully yet
Read the full transcript
17:28Mike Isaac:because like well there hasn't been a big there hasn't been a big trial like there's been i'm sure some like epic apple stuff that was slightly big but but nothing where nothing nothing anything at this scale with this much even just this much volume already from people that are generally interested in in in the story yeah the outcome and like i think the other thing you should know
17:52TBPN:is like they're not sequestered like they show up kind of like before like anyone else right before Or they, yeah, like literally like we see them walking in and the marshals, there's like a ton of like U.S. marshals there. They're like, is anyone a juror in this line? The juror gets to go in. And at the end of every day, the judge is like, goes back over the rules saying, do not discuss this case with anyone. Do not watch it on TV. Do not look at it on your phone, which is like a verbal command. Yeah, don't go on your phone. It's not taking your phone.
18:23Mike Isaac:Just don't.
18:24TBPN:Exactly.
18:24Mike Isaac:Hey, don't use the most addictive thing that has ever been created in human history. Don't use the thing that you use for six hours a day.
18:32TBPN:That you probably need to turn your lights on and adjust your thermostat. Totally. I mean, that's something I had not thought of, Jordi, but it's a really good... Like, when does that come up at some point? That's very worried. Not necessarily here, but just ever.
18:48Mike Isaac:Yeah, it seems like something that the court should be paying attention to heading into a decision from the jury. How much is the history between Opening Eyes Council, Bill, who represented Twitter when Elon was trying to get out of the Twitter buyout? And ultimately, it feels like the X slash Twitter acquisition has worked out pretty well for Elon. He's made a number of plays, so hard to imagine him deeply regretting buying it, even though at the time he was happy to get out until Bill said, no, we're doing this.
19:35TBPN:You know what's funny? He is – I can't underscore enough how different the tenor chain – I mean, look, it's opposing counsel, so it's always going to be different. But Elon went from like, I am a entrepreneur, sort of like Rosalie explaining to you what I think the future should look like and like very concerned for the future of the human race. So like openly antagonistic to Savitt's questioning. And like and the thing that I'm very curious how this plays with the jury is like Elon was very he's like, I'm a literal guy. Like the questions you're asking me are like too complicated or like they're not yes or no questions, which is like fair, like as a grievance.
20:19TBPN:But also the thing he either doesn't understand or doesn't care about understanding is that that's just lawyers. Like that's the whole point of a cross-examination is to ask these questions as as reductively as possible to to get a type of answer they're looking for. and his job or his, you know, pre-trial sort of discussions with his own lawyers is to know how to navigate those essentially while also telling the truth. So I don't know. They just don't like each other or at least Elon doesn't like Savit and you can very, it's very clear that he's just like mad at that. And whenever Elon gets sassy, I would hear like clearly people who are fans of Musk like laughing behind me or being like, yeah, you got him.
21:02TBPN:Like, blah. It's just, it's very, it's very funny. It's like kind of a, it's different than the usual vibe is what I'd say. That's very interesting.
21:12Mike Isaac:Outlook, what's going on Monday? What's the outlook for next week?
21:16TBPN:This week was the Elon side for the most part. Are we going to flip to Sam and Greg and some other open AI folks? Or is there an intermediate step? Like, do you have a clear view of what the next couple of weeks look like? yeah so it's a little rough because we we have witness lists in full that they presented and are in evidence but they you don't really learn who's coming until like very soon that week it's actually a giant pain in the ass for me and for reporters who are trying to schedule but like so we jared birchall who's like must family office guy just finished testifying uh we're going to get uh this guy steward russell today no no sorry that was yesterday and anyway you said birchaw was very dry like was that intentional that feels like that does not work in favor of like swinging a jury was that more for the judge like what was the goal of that uh of that uh testimony i think it was to really just sort of show how musk was trying to set up this like like structure things as a non-profit and like hammer home like he's always wanted it to be a non-profit and he's not sort of like so it was it was uh i believe it was musk's witness who open ai then cross-examined and open ai used the occasion to show an email that had like a proposed equity structure for musk and so like they both kind of used him differently but i think like Like, Birchall's like a, essentially an accountant books guy, like, behind the scenes.
22:53TBPN:So I think it was like, here's the people behind the curtain. Here's how they were dealing with the finances. Here's how Musk was like, this is only a charity. And then OpenAI's lawyers were like, actually, check this shit out. So, but I think, like, I honestly don't know. They also struck some of his testimony because, this is a little complicated, but if you remember last year, open AI or Musk made a bid with Ari Emanuel and some other companies. That's right, to buy the whole company. And that opened the door or that sort of complicates things for Musk's side because there might be some of those discussions around that bid admitted into evidence.
23:38TBPN:And that may not be good for Musk because if there's like weird compromising emails in there. So like it's gotten complicated. But next week we're getting Stuart Russell's safety researcher. We got Greg Brockman, maybe Sam Altman, maybe not. It's four days a week in court only, so we may not have time, but I got to be ready. I'll be there most of the time, but I'll be there for Sam for sure. And then I don't know.
24:05Mike Isaac:Sorry, rewinding a second. Did they bid on the PVC, like the for-profit arm?
24:12TBPN:Yeah, it was the yeah. And they wanted to just sort of I don't actually know what their plans were afterwards, but like it was like trying to take over the asset, those assets, basically, and then, you know, morph it into what they I mean, they knew that it wasn't going to get accepted as a bid, basically. but it was like uh and then birchall sorry birchall in court was saying this was us trying to sort of establish a pricing uh mechanism to like value the actual entity itself and that was gonna help them somehow i actually am not quite sure how that would help them somehow but uh someone in the chat is probably smarter than me i'm not but like it was them trying to sort of take that over and i think opening i said publicly at the time this is like a stalling tactic they're trying to like slow us down while also using this in court in this concurrent lawsuit later basically so it's all like really messy and i think even musk side took a risk there if those emails get into discovery but it's unclear to me if that's gonna happen if we if they are then we
25:23Mike Isaac:may see them next week why would why would that that kind of discovery process around that bid be coming up now when everyone involved was well aware that it had happened quite a long time ago?
25:38TBPN:So I think because of a line of questioning with Burchall yesterday about the bid, that like if that happens on the stand, and again, like a lawyer gut check me here because I'm a stupid tech reporter. But if that happens on the stand, then it gives an entry point for opening eyes lawyers to be like, okay, well, we need to, you know, now admit, basically the judge said to Must side, you open this line of questioning. Now it's fair game to go into this. And then you can start calling new evidence in around that, like to open up discovery. It's like really like strategy. And like, you have to be careful in your strategy when you're asking certain questions in court.
26:19TBPN:I've been learning a lot about it. So maybe it's a strategic misstep by Tobaroff, Elon's lawyer, but it's not quite clear yet. Do you have an idea of the purpose of the AI safety researchers testifying? What the goal is there? Does that align with one particular side? If there's more nonprofits, you still probably wind up with Anthropic, DeepMind, XAI. Having one more focused nonprofit going on for a long time doesn't necessarily lead me to oh, then we wouldn't be in an AI race. It's not a clear solve for me, but I imagine that one side is trying to position this as important. But do you have any predictions for what that goal is?
27:05TBPN:Totally. So this is Musk's witness, and your point is well made, which is like, okay, even if you kneecap one, good luck on literally everyone else. And there's been a lot of time spent, Elon talking smack about Larry Page and how he doesn't trust him anymore. That's actually been really fun to hear. But the point, I believe, is this is actually a point of contention. So the judge does not, the judge prohibited, like, going too far into, like, doomerism into the world stuff. And she's like, look, that's kind of a sideshow distraction. Like, extinction humanity stuff is not the point of this case.
27:42TBPN:But Must Side called this guy because they want someone. And this is my understanding is that Stuart is like very lined with the idea that AI is super dangerous and going to harm us all. And so if you get this guy in there at that point, how does that not like.
28:02Mike Isaac:If this guy is going to come on and say that AI like the most insane like Doomer point of view, which I think is. everyone's going to have their own opinion around this debate it's worth completely worthy of having and talking about uh but but how does elon square that with like i'm trying to build the biggest cluster possible and you know distill on the rest of the industry's model and you know create tens of gigawatts of space compute. And like, how does that, how does that, like, can't this kind of witness potentially backfire in some capacity? No, I mean, you're exactly right
28:46TBPN:in that squaring that circle is pretty hard and like exactly what OpenAI is like I should be, I should be,
28:54Mike Isaac:I should be trusted with the, you know, all powerful.
28:58TBPN:We're going to be in the Terminator situation. Speaker 3 0. Speaker 3 0. Speaker 3 No matter what, do you want me in charge of the terminators? Not some other guy, not some nonprofit, not some, well, well positioned to holders. Speaker 3 0.
29:10Mike Isaac:Speaker 3 He's basically making, he's, he's, he's pivoting Tesla production to a terminators, the terminators basically. Speaker 3 Yeah.
29:19TBPN:Speaker 3 0. Speaker 3 No, I, I, and like, can I just make one last point is that I just think he, he misunderstood the terminator because like we still survive and we fight back in that Do you remember? I've been saying this. People haven't seen the movie. Geordi actually hasn't seen the Terminator. But in all of these. Are you kidding me, dude? I've seen five movies. In all of these movies, like it completely leaves out that there is a problem and then humanity overcomes it. And so it's like if there is a Terminator scenario, like I just want to know that you're on my side as the resistance fighting back.
29:54TBPN:And like, who is John Connor here? You are John Connor. hopefully I mean I would yeah it's I don't know I don't want to get into the the full you casky thing but like like it is reasonable to be to to to sort of steel man that like if it is bad right now it's not it's that says I have to watch Terminator I've got to watch Terminator
30:13Mike Isaac:tonight you got to watch Terminator okay so literally I just saw this on Twitter Terminator
30:18TBPN:2 is coming back into IMAX pretty soon like you can go see it in the theater so you have to go
30:23Mike Isaac:see it jordy like it's it's required viewing let's go together yeah i'm down i'm down do you do you have any i would say that so far the trial is less i mean it's hard for the trial to go very viral because there's no audio video and it's just like live blogging and you could imagine you can imagine some of these scenes like just the stuff that you're typing i'm like if that was on video that gets like 50 million views in like you know in a few hours on on on x you know across a bunch of these different aggregator accounts um but part is is maybe part of the like my my feeling is like it's just so it's just so like i feel like the entire tech industry it's like it's just kind of depressing to see to see these groups like fighting in this way when we have so much bigger problem like we have so many bigger problems as an industry right the big problem being like public perception of ai is like already so bad like people you know don't don't like you know just have two people just like no matter who wins we all lose or something like that
31:32TBPN:like there's some very negative stuff i mean that so i totally agree and i do think actually um everyone, not everyone, but like many in the AI industry have started realizing, oh, we have, like, not everyone loves us. Like, this is a perception problem in a lot of ways, which like, to me is funny because like, I, not that I'm smart, but I feel like I've known that for a little while. And, but it's, the issue is the industry is coming around to that, or at least certain folks are and know that they want to change that perception. But this case has been in the system for like three years now and sort of like actually happening at a time where they wouldn't want it to necessarily happen if they're trying to change it so the timing just sucks for for folks who don't like that if that makes sense yeah there's so many different like little tidbits and i don't know if they're going to be exact quotes but you can just imagine plenty of things that are going to happen on the stand winding up on a bernie sanders post and being like stop it pause ai right because like you know it's always like give the tech people enough rope to hang themselves and like there's a lot of rope going out the next couple weeks oh my god it's totally you gotta one of y 'all both of y 'all should just show up to the courtroom at some point and like experience it because i mean you have an actual day job but it's like literally it's really interesting and like an experience so you you can't record video you can't record audio But is there a world where you have like five of your own stenographers there taking a perfect transcript?
33:08TBPN:Would that be possible with enough resources?
33:11Mike Isaac:And then we could do a table reading on this show.
33:13TBPN:That's what I'm thinking is that you could use voice cloning. I don't know if you noticed this. Tyler, what was it? Grok launched voice cloning today or something? Oh, my God. Why is that controversial again? Well, I mean, we've had this technology for like five years and then no one released it
33:27Mike Isaac:because you don't want people to make deepfakes of other people's voices.
33:29TBPN:Okay, yeah, because it's like textbook. It's like, oh, I call you John.
33:34Mike Isaac:I need like 500 bucks. Can you give me your credit card for a second?
33:39TBPN:Yeah, so obviously there's a bunch of risky uses of that. The good use is the comedic table read in the voice of Sam Altman, in the voice of Greg Brockman, in the voice of Elon Musk, that we can all enjoy.
33:51Mike Isaac:I was thinking more of doing basically end of the day. Yeah. there's like we do a play here yeah that's probably all of a bunch of oh my god makeup
34:00TBPN:full costume you know there are transcription services okay and even like you could do you
34:07Mike Isaac:could be mike isaac by oh yeah we need someone playing you for sure no no no it's like it's a
34:14TBPN:cameo he's oh he's playing himself and uh yeah you gotta go and the whole the whole time just
34:19Mike Isaac:crashing out. Like I forgot my lunch. I forgot to fill up my water.
34:25TBPN:I had a banana. Oh my God. Okay. Can I just say there is an attorney there that looks exactly like Nathan Fielder and I'm like, almost like, are you sure? It looks like Nathan Fielder. Okay. I, every time I see him, I'm like, is this like a bit like, I'm, am I going to be on TV in some way? It's very intense. And you're going to ask him next year. I mean, Elon Musk says the funniest outcomes the most likely and that might be yeah seriously what is the funniest outcome the funniest outcome is like elon wins and the penalty is like is like 50 bucks or something like that it's like it's like elon like you win here's here's 150 dollars enjoy just the most like inconsequential fine for the ai industry which is flush with cash at all times
35:12Mike Isaac:Well, I find that like fine, like there's so many, anytime a company in tech gets, gets fined or not every time, but often it's like, okay.
35:22TBPN:Sometimes it's a fine for ants. Yeah.
35:23Mike Isaac:Like they, they, they did something that was bad. They generated a hundred million of revenue and the fine is like$1.5 million. Yeah. It's like, did that.
35:33TBPN:I think the current meta YouTube lawsuit was like maybe a$10 million settlement. Of course there was like knock on of potential for class. Oh, yeah. That was for one individual. That was one individual. But still, it was like you have this like landmark case, this big build, and then you're like, oh, how damaging is it going to be? It's going to be like five minutes of revenue. But the stock actually in meta earnings as far, I mean, there was a lot of shit that took the stock down. But like I think one of them was them saying like this might have a material impact. Like these cases may have a material impact in the future if it opens the door.
36:09TBPN:So like, yeah, I agree. Like it's always remedies are always like it can be existential from a financial point of view, but also just from a guess what? This is about to become your whole fucking life for the next 10 years or whatever, if that makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. We talked to a law professor who said like the question is, does social media exist in the future? Like this is an existential moment. I'm not sure that we're quite there, but there is definitely a risk and you need to consider that if you're an investor. Anyway, what's the game plan for next week? What's going in? Are you doing trail mix?
36:44TBPN:Are you doing protein bars? I want you fueled up, ready to go.
36:50Mike Isaac:You should be able to do like a sponsored camelback.
36:55TBPN:Did you ever watch jury do the show jury? Oh, yeah, of course. I want to be the guy with like the chair pants and the water thing attached to my back. and like I need I'm gonna this is blogging this is back in my blogging all things digital blog days man this is this is it so I will train this weekend more prepared this weekend that's right you should go sit in a chair for eight hours straight are you are you gonna do all four days are you doing all four days I think we're gonna switch off a little more I apologize I will not be my like disastrous falling apart self every day of the week just maybe two days of the week So you should follow Cade Metz, my other colleague who's there.
37:36TBPN:Although he is much more put together and does not tweet like a person off their meds like I do. So it'll be a different vibe each day. But I will be there next week. Last question. Is this book material? Does it rise to that quality, this drama? I really think someone's got to write.
37:55Mike Isaac:I would write a book on your coverage of this trial.
37:58TBPN:Yes, that's what I want to read. the Mike and then I would do a podcast about it I would do a podcast about it and then someone would make a book about the podcast about the book covering we'll create a content Ouroboros here just keep it going someday I don't know we'll see anyway thank you so much great to catch up good to see you Mike thanks for the update we'll talk to you soon I'll see you soon
From the publisher
This is our full conversation with Mike Isaac, recorded live on TBPN.
We discuss what it’s actually like inside the OpenAI vs. Elon Musk courtroom, from early morning lines and limited seating to the unexpected mix of superfans, reporters, and curious spectators, how Elon’s legal strategy blends big-picture “save humanity” messaging with more tactical arguments around control and competition, and why the case often feels less like a traditional trial and more like theater, where personality, narrative, and jury perception may matter just as much as the underlying facts.
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