"Financially, what will take me to $1B?" That is what Greg Brockman wrote in his private journal in 2017. At the time, he was the chairman and co-founder of OpenAI, a nonprofit research lab dedicated to ensuring artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity.

On Monday, those journal entries were read aloud in federal court during Elon Musk's lawsuit against OpenAI. They are devastating. They show a nonprofit director privately obsessing about personal wealth while publicly championing humanity's future.

"Pretty Morally Bankrupt"

The journal entries get worse. "It'd be wrong to steal the nonprofit from him," Brockman wrote, referring to Sam Altman. "To convert to a b-corp without him. That'd be pretty morally bankrupt."

Then this: "Maybe we should just flip to a for-profit. Making money for us sounds great." And this: "Cannot say we are committed to the nonprofit. Don't wanna say we're committed. If three months later we're doing a b-corp it is a lie."

Remember: These entries are from 2017. OpenAI was founded as a nonprofit in 2015 with a mission to develop AGI "for the benefit of humanity as a whole." Donors were told their contributions would fund research, not executive wealth. Brockman was thinking about his billion-dollar payday two years in.

$250,000 Expert Witness Testimony

Stuart Russell, the AI safety researcher, testified as an expert witness in the case. He was paid $5,000 per hour for approximately 50 hours of work, totaling around $250,000. Russell argued that OpenAI's shift from nonprofit to for-profit fundamentally changed its incentives and risk calculus.

When Musk's lawyer asked why Brockman didn't donate his $29 billion stake back to the nonprofit after the conversion, OpenAI's lawyer objected: "Theatrical grandstanding." But the question hangs in the air. If you truly believed in the nonprofit mission, why keep the windfall?

The Verge's Elizabeth Lopatto, who has been covering the trial, wrote: "I don't think I'd trust him to watch my bag while I used the restroom." That captures the room.

IPO Confirmation

In a separate revelation, Brockman confirmed for the first time publicly that OpenAI is exploring an initial public offering. This has been speculated for months, but Monday marked the first official acknowledgment from a co-founder.

The timing is interesting. OpenAI is facing regulatory scrutiny, safety concerns, and now a federal lawsuit exposing internal documents. An IPO would provide liquidity for early stakeholders like Brockman, but it would also subject the company to public market pressures that could conflict with long-term AI safety.

The journal entries paint a picture of someone who saw dollar signs while talking about humanity's future. That disconnect between public mission and private motivation is exactly what Musk's lawsuit is designed to expose. Based on Monday's testimony, it's working.

Sources: The Verge (Elizabeth Lopatto), Business Insider (Jacob Shamsian), NYT (Cade Metz), NBC News, Bloomberg, ABC7, CNBC