6 ms·

OpenAI president forced to read his personal diary entries to jury

88 points by koolba 5mo ago

koolba 5mo ago
From the article, emphasis mine: > Additionally, Brockman’s journal showed him grappling with whether voting against Musk’s plan or for Musk’s ejection from the board would be morally wrong. > “Can’t see us turning this into a for-profit without a very nasty fight,” Brockman wrote in another entry. “It’d be wrong to steal the non-profit from him. That’d be pretty morally bankrupt.” This is pretty damning for OpenAI. And ties in quite tightly to Musk's comment earlier this week of "It's not okay to steal a charity.".
- Xunjin 5mo ago
  Another part also says: "After Musk announced he was resigning from OpenAI in February 2018, Musk gave a departing speech at an all-hands meeting, Brockman testified. In front of about 40 OpenAI employees, Musk said that he was leaving because the only viable path that he saw forward was for OpenAI to merge with Tesla. However, the other leaders did not think so, Musk said, choosing a different path that Musk would never choose. According to Brockman, the speech was meant to lower morale at OpenAI, as workers understood that Musk was leaving to pursue artificial general intelligence (AGI) at Tesla because he no longer had confidence in OpenAI." Still his goals was to merge with Tesla... Ain't this also steal a charity?
  - yieldcrv 5mo ago
    he didn’t so they litigate what did happen
  - mcmcmc 5mo ago
    Yep. Both sides just look like assholes
  - watwut 5mo ago
    I mean, the claim here is not that Musk is not an asshole. This is a court case where two assholes fight about who defrauded that other one more successfully. Whoever wins and whoever looses, we know both involved men have pretty non-existent morality. And in the grand scheme of things, OpenAI being charity was always bullshit too.
    - palmotea 5mo ago
      > Whoever wins and whoever looses, we know both involved men don't have pretty non-existent morality. I'm guessing that double negative is a mistake. Do you mean to strike the "don't" to make it "have pretty non-existent morality" or just "both involved men don't have morality"?
      - watwut 5mo ago
        Thank you. I corrected it.
    - Fraterkes 5mo ago
      Ianal but openais defense seems to actually have spent some time in the hearings showing examples of Musk’s (perceived) hypocrisy (him not giving to charity because he views his companies as societally beneficial), which suggests to me that this stuff is legislatively relevant
  - notnullorvoid 5mo ago
    I don't really want to advocate for Musk, but is it not possible that his goal was to merge with Tesla as an alternative to OpenAI becoming a seperate for-profit. If the option of staying a non-profit was going off the table I'd also probably want to advocate for merging with an existing for-profit I own that had aligned interests.
- balance006 5mo ago
  Doing fractional Head of AI work for mid-market operators for the past year, I get the same question every discovery call: "what happens to my data and my workflow if [vendor] gets bought, sued, or pivots?" The Brockman diary is the rare moment where the people running the vendor write the answer in their own words, in real time. What it actually shows is the people closest to the conversion knew the governance risk was real and contested. Not an argument for picking sides between Musk and Altman. An argument for the boring practitioner version: if your business depends on a model API, your contract and your switching cost are the only things that matter. The internal ethics of the vendor are not a hedge. We default to Claude for client work right now with the explicit caveat that we'd swap to whichever model is best and cheapest in 18 months, and we structure the stack so they can. That's the lesson the diary should put on every CTO's whiteboard, regardless of who they think is the bad actor.
- Darmani 5mo ago
  > This is pretty damning for OpenAI I don't see how. Cases are decided by facts and law, not feelings -- except to the extent those feelings are probative of state of mind, which is relevant for some legal issues but not others. My understanding is that the crux of the case is on the extent to which a number of informal messages should be considered a binding contract. Trying to go from a single admission like this to an overall legal conclusion is a lot like seeing a single line in a program and then concluding there's a bug -- without having ever seen the rest of the program. You might think "this line always crashes, " but actually it's never called (does not go to any matter at issue), or none of the terms mean what you think they mean, etc.
- cameldrv 5mo ago
  From what I heard at the time, Elon was running OpenAI as, to some degree an element of the Elon keritsu. Neurallink was upstairs from OpenAI, and OpenAI badges would open doors at Tesla and vice-versa. Elon will also move people from one of his companies to another if the need arises. I think some of the OpenAI execs were very upset when he moved Karpathy from OpenAI to Tesla to take over Autopilot.
- beAbU 5mo ago
  Ofcourse you can steal a charity! So long as it's not _his_ charity.
- tim333 5mo ago
  Though as far as I can tell the charity which Musk put about $30m into still exists and holds 26% of OpenAI's commercial arm valued at ~200bn. So rather than being stolen it's still there and with 7000x as much assets? Not sure how that plays out legally? It looks hard for Musk to win to me. IANAL.
  - captn3m0 5mo ago
    IANAL, but as an analogy perhaps: Some of the investments made from FTX stolen assets got amazing gains (Anthropic being a notable investment). But it doesn’t undo the crime.
    - tim333 5mo ago
      In FTX's case there obviously was a crime - stealing customer money. With OpenAI I don't really see it, hence I guess the lack of a criminal case. The 'stealing a charity' bit is more metaphorical - it wasn't actually stolen, just the control kind of moving from friends of Musk to friends of Altman which was inevitable when Musk quit. I think Musk is alleging unjust enrichment of Altman and Brockman but given they only have a small percentage in the for profit they set up it's going to be hard to prove that's unjust in court I guess. You could argue OpenAI had drifted from its mission to be open.
misiti3780 5mo ago
Who keeps a personal diary in 2026?
- deleted 5mo ago
  [deleted]
- hdndjsbbs 5mo ago
  It's actually very helpful! Even just to keep track of what you did and how you were feeling on a given day. I didn't keep one for a long time because I grew up in a household where I didn't feel secure - if I had a journal my parents would have snooped for sure. As I've gotten older I (a) see the value in remembering the past (b) feel more trust in the people around me. Highly recommend trying a journalling habit for a month. It's also very satisfying to do it in a little notebook with a pen instead of typing. It feels more tangible.
- THansenite 5mo ago
  It is actually a decent sized community. As someone who works in technology, I enjoy the aspect of actually creating something physical when so much is ones and zeros on silicone. While not daily, I try to journal regularly as a practice to slow down, focus my thoughts, and use it as therapy to get frustrations/emotions/musings out so I can move on.
- jjulius 5mo ago
  I do! It's cathartic and peaceful. :) What's the big deal if people do? Why judge? Why even... care? :)
- add-sub-mul-div 5mo ago
  Sometimes a sentence can end with a question mark but demonstrate the diametric opposite of curiosity.
  - misiti3780 5mo ago
    you going to document this exchange in your diary ? 5/6/2026 Drank a cup of coffee; Made snarky remark to HN user.
THansenite 5mo ago
I honestly don't know how I feel about this. I keep a journal where I can get thoughts out of my head so I can move on. Like the article, its nothing I'd really be ashamed of, but I see it as a kind of personal therapy where I can dump my thoughts. I write with the assumption they are my private thoughts and even I don't have any plans on going back and rereading. I know I'm not a CEO, but even I wouldn't want my private thoughts brought into a courtroom that I never thought would see the light of day.
- lesuorac 5mo ago
  Yeah, the Framers of the constitution felt the same as you and the 5th amendment used to apply to your belongings as well so a diary you wrote couldn't be used against you.
  - bonsai_spool 5mo ago
    > your belongings as well so a diary you wrote couldn't be used against you What's the history around this? And don't these protections only relate to criminal proceedings? edit: seems the parent is referring to the historical entity of the mere evidence rule which isn't the same as saying that the Framers believed a certain interpretation for the 4/5th amendments.
    - JackFr 5mo ago
      The right against self-incrimination is limited in civil trials. Additionally, unlike criminal trials where a jury will be instructed that a defendant's refusal to answer cannot be construed as evidence, there is no such instruction in civil trials, and it is common to argue that a refusal to answer indicates hiding something.
  - solomatov 5mo ago
    Could you share links about this? When it turned into a different interpretation?
    - 5mo ago
dmix 5mo ago
> Ultimately, the OpenAI president had to read some of the most embarrassing entries aloud in front of a jury and a packed courthouse, as well as over a YouTube livestream that peaked at around 1,200 viewers. Anyone know which livestream they are talking about? Edit: found it, audio-only and no archive https://www.youtube.com/@USDCCAND/streams https://www.youtube.com/@USDCCAND/streams
skrebbel 5mo ago
Seriously is nothing sacred anymore? Like I think the entirety of OpenAI leadership are scumbags but how is it OK to force someone, anyone, to publish their most private thoughts? EDIT: I sorry read over this part: > OpenAI submitted the journals as evidence in October that was initially sealed and then unsealed in January So they chose to submit it as evidence themselves. I stand corrected, insane move though, why would you submit your own private notes as evidence in a high-stakes court case?
- arduanika 5mo ago
  > anymore? This is how discovery has always worked. > submitted Doesn't necessarily mean they volunteered it. Either submission or the unsealing could have been in response to a subpoena or court ruling. Maybe the solution is to write at the top of your journal that you are cc'ing your lawyer on it. (Not legal advice!)
  - deleted 5mo ago
    [deleted]
  - skrebbel 5mo ago
    > > anymore? > This is how discovery has always worked. So if I say a worry to my therapist, and years later I get sued in a civil lawsuit, my opponents can just ask the therapist for their meeting notes and those get submitted and then published on the internet? No, I assume? So then where's the line? I'm no lawyer (in fact I'm a total noob in this area) but seems very weird to me that private notes can just be subpoena'd like that.
    - jwolfe 5mo ago
      Your work laptop documents are not private personal notes. This is also partially why I do not log in to work accounts on personal devices or personal accounts on work devices.
    - eadler 5mo ago
      NAL but generally familiar with law. Medical (and especially therapy) notes, attorney/client communications, and a few other have privilege [1] and you would not /required/ to submit this. If the opposing side requested something that turned them up, and they were responsive, you'd include a response and include a reference in a "privilege log" [0] What is privileged is subtle and often overstated. You can't just put "attorney/client privilege" and CC a lawyer — you need to be asking a genuine legal question. Google almost got in trouble for something like this [2]. Private notes, including diaries, are not privileged. I'd like to see some serious proposals for "diary privilege" but no state has such a rule. [0] https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/creating-privilege-logs-a-best-2761084/ https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/creating-privilege-logs-a-... [1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/privileged_communication https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/privileged_communication [2] https://www.proskauer.com/blog/the-sound-of-silent-attorneys-doj-alleges-google-fakes-attorney-client-privilege-by-ccing-lawyers-who-never-respond https://www.proskauer.com/blog/the-sound-of-silent-attorneys... — although they won later appeals. My point here is that its complicated.
dgellow 5mo ago
> OpenAI submitted the journals as evidence in October that was initially sealed and then unsealed in January. How does that work? How can a company submit a personal journal as evidence? That feels extremely intrusive
- jeffwask 5mo ago
  He kept them on his work laptop, and they were swept up in discovery. Don't ignore your security team when they talk about data protection and not doing personal business on work devices.
  - cogman10 5mo ago
    Even if it were a notebook, it could end up in court. If someone sees you writing in a book and talks about it during discovery, you can end up with a court order to produce that book.
    - bombcar 5mo ago
      Discovery can even be more broad - "provide all written or recorded messages involving this decision" and if you "forget" about your private diary and it's later found out, that's a paddlin'.
      - jeffwask 5mo ago
        Absolutely, they can be but your lawyers at least have a leg to stand on to push for exclusion. If they are just sitting next to the PowerPoint you gave on Tuesday, they will definitely be included.
- cogman10 5mo ago
  If you learn anything from this, it's that anything you write can ultimately show up in court. You have no right to privacy and your written words, no matter where they are written, are subject to be taken as evidence. Yes it feels intrusive, but it's literally the first thing a lawyer would ask for.
wslh 5mo ago
Privacy and privilege (e.g. attorney/client) are different things, but I'd be curious about the edge cases here: can a personal journal become privileged or protected?
nohell 5mo ago
[flagged]
stevetron 5mo ago
Aside from the disheartening forced-reading of this deeply-personal journal, I've gleaned from it that Musk wanted to bring OpenAI into Tesla, and OpenAI leaders did not. My thought is "OF COURSE" Musk would want to bring it in under his corporate control. I'm glad it didn't.
weinzierl 5mo ago
Would it have helped him if he had encrypted it, or would he have had to reveal it anyway?
- SoftTalker 5mo ago
  Would he have had to provide it if it were locked in a safe?
- bombcar 5mo ago
  He would have to reveal it, and refusing to decrypt would be a contempt of court charge, or a "jury, presume that everything in this damn document is the worst you can imagine." This is why politicians don't write things down and can 'never recall'.
- j-bos 5mo ago
  With a duress password, it could have allowed him to destroy it, but that itself would be illegal and he'd likely be found in contempt of court and probably with some other charges related to tampering with evidence. But he wouldn't have had to have read it in court. IANAL
didip 5mo ago
I know a lot of people use private conversations with chatbot as a replacement to journaling which is a form of self therapy. So… those can be aired willy nilly too then. They are out on public clouds now.
- globalnode 5mo ago
  have to use a local llm for that if thats how you wish to use them.
  - dgellow 5mo ago
    But your local logs can be requested as well
    - bombcar 5mo ago
      You need a rigorous and enforced deletion policy setup years before you get subpoenaed.
poszlem 5mo ago
I cannot believe nobody brought up that episode of The Office with Jan’s deposition. This is both sad and hilarious, just like in the show. https://youtu.be/V3GbCByGltU?si=ctDluaazxGJ-Io81&t=215 https://youtu.be/V3GbCByGltU?si=ctDluaazxGJ-Io81&t=215
brap 5mo ago
I’m too paranoid to write a diary, even a handwritten one, and I’m literally a nobody. It’s beyond me how these super important (and controversial) people keep diaries where they lay out their evil plots like a villain from Scooby Doo. And save it on a work computer.
- NordStreamYacht 5mo ago
  They do it to keep track of the stories they have told different people.
- SoftTalker 5mo ago
  Jounaling is a habit of most of the highly successful people I know (granted, that's a single-digit number, so TIFWIW).
- Levitz 5mo ago
  Journaling is widely recognized as a positive for mental health I think?
- joshstrange 5mo ago
  > I’m too paranoid to write a diary, even a handwritten one, and I’m literally a nobody. Also a nobody and I feel this. See also: therapy, I'm sure I would/could benefit from it but I have zero trust that those records wouldn't be leaked/stolen/compelled in the future. Especially with the current US government, I wouldn't want a (more of a) record of "wrongthink" (whatever the window shifts to make that in the future).
prosunpraiser 5mo ago
How the hell is it even admissible?
teshier-A 5mo ago
Can't help but notice this is now on the second page of HN (position 42), 37 minutes after being posted with 52 points. I was top 10 when I clicked
- dgellow 5mo ago
  That just means HN anti-flamewar has been triggered, it’s fairly standard on this site for controversial topics
  - AnimalMuppet 5mo ago
    More comments than upvotes. That's at least part of the flamewar detector.
  - teshier-A 5mo ago
    I wasn't aware, thank you
deleted 5mo ago
[deleted]
j-bos 5mo ago
If it weren't for it being OpenAI, this story would not be noteworthy. I think a more interesting story is how many commenters on Hacker News have no idea how discovery or privilege works. Interesting blind spot.
1vuio0pswjnm7 5mo ago
"Ultimately, the OpenAI president had to read some of the most embarrassing entries aloud in front of a jury and a packed courthouse, as well as over a YouTube livestream that peaked at around 1,200 viewers." Live audio https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6ZoBSAqmq4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6ZoBSAqmq4
- 1vuio0pswjnm7 5mo ago
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eY7wda6U8sg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eY7wda6U8sg
- THansenite 5mo ago
  I'm imagining a Dungeon Crawler Carl style view-meter that shows more people tuning in as he gets to some juicier parts of his journal. B-b-b-b-b-b-b-osss BATTLE!!!!

88 points by koolba 5mo ago

From the article, emphasis mine: > Additionally, Brockman’s journal showed him grappling with whether voting against Musk’s plan or for Musk’s ejection from the board would be morally wrong. > “Can’t see us turning this into a for-profit without a very nasty fight,” Brockman wrote in another entry. “It’d be wrong to steal the non-profit from him. That’d be pretty morally bankrupt.” This is pretty damning for OpenAI. And ties in quite tightly to Musk's comment earlier this week of "It's not okay to steal a charity.".

Xunjin 5mo ago
Another part also says: "After Musk announced he was resigning from OpenAI in February 2018, Musk gave a departing speech at an all-hands meeting, Brockman testified. In front of about 40 OpenAI employees, Musk said that he was leaving because the only viable path that he saw forward was for OpenAI to merge with Tesla. However, the other leaders did not think so, Musk said, choosing a different path that Musk would never choose. According to Brockman, the speech was meant to lower morale at OpenAI, as workers understood that Musk was leaving to pursue artificial general intelligence (AGI) at Tesla because he no longer had confidence in OpenAI." Still his goals was to merge with Tesla... Ain't this also steal a charity?
- yieldcrv 5mo ago
  he didn’t so they litigate what did happen
- mcmcmc 5mo ago
  Yep. Both sides just look like assholes
- watwut 5mo ago
  I mean, the claim here is not that Musk is not an asshole. This is a court case where two assholes fight about who defrauded that other one more successfully. Whoever wins and whoever looses, we know both involved men have pretty non-existent morality. And in the grand scheme of things, OpenAI being charity was always bullshit too.
  - palmotea 5mo ago
    > Whoever wins and whoever looses, we know both involved men don't have pretty non-existent morality. I'm guessing that double negative is a mistake. Do you mean to strike the "don't" to make it "have pretty non-existent morality" or just "both involved men don't have morality"?
    - watwut 5mo ago
      Thank you. I corrected it.
  - Fraterkes 5mo ago
    Ianal but openais defense seems to actually have spent some time in the hearings showing examples of Musk’s (perceived) hypocrisy (him not giving to charity because he views his companies as societally beneficial), which suggests to me that this stuff is legislatively relevant
- notnullorvoid 5mo ago
  I don't really want to advocate for Musk, but is it not possible that his goal was to merge with Tesla as an alternative to OpenAI becoming a seperate for-profit. If the option of staying a non-profit was going off the table I'd also probably want to advocate for merging with an existing for-profit I own that had aligned interests.
balance006 5mo ago
Doing fractional Head of AI work for mid-market operators for the past year, I get the same question every discovery call: "what happens to my data and my workflow if [vendor] gets bought, sued, or pivots?" The Brockman diary is the rare moment where the people running the vendor write the answer in their own words, in real time. What it actually shows is the people closest to the conversion knew the governance risk was real and contested. Not an argument for picking sides between Musk and Altman. An argument for the boring practitioner version: if your business depends on a model API, your contract and your switching cost are the only things that matter. The internal ethics of the vendor are not a hedge. We default to Claude for client work right now with the explicit caveat that we'd swap to whichever model is best and cheapest in 18 months, and we structure the stack so they can. That's the lesson the diary should put on every CTO's whiteboard, regardless of who they think is the bad actor.
Darmani 5mo ago
> This is pretty damning for OpenAI I don't see how. Cases are decided by facts and law, not feelings -- except to the extent those feelings are probative of state of mind, which is relevant for some legal issues but not others. My understanding is that the crux of the case is on the extent to which a number of informal messages should be considered a binding contract. Trying to go from a single admission like this to an overall legal conclusion is a lot like seeing a single line in a program and then concluding there's a bug -- without having ever seen the rest of the program. You might think "this line always crashes, " but actually it's never called (does not go to any matter at issue), or none of the terms mean what you think they mean, etc.
cameldrv 5mo ago
From what I heard at the time, Elon was running OpenAI as, to some degree an element of the Elon keritsu. Neurallink was upstairs from OpenAI, and OpenAI badges would open doors at Tesla and vice-versa. Elon will also move people from one of his companies to another if the need arises. I think some of the OpenAI execs were very upset when he moved Karpathy from OpenAI to Tesla to take over Autopilot.
beAbU 5mo ago
Ofcourse you can steal a charity! So long as it's not _his_ charity.
tim333 5mo ago
Though as far as I can tell the charity which Musk put about $30m into still exists and holds 26% of OpenAI's commercial arm valued at ~200bn. So rather than being stolen it's still there and with 7000x as much assets? Not sure how that plays out legally? It looks hard for Musk to win to me. IANAL.
- captn3m0 5mo ago
  IANAL, but as an analogy perhaps: Some of the investments made from FTX stolen assets got amazing gains (Anthropic being a notable investment). But it doesn’t undo the crime.
  - tim333 5mo ago
    In FTX's case there obviously was a crime - stealing customer money. With OpenAI I don't really see it, hence I guess the lack of a criminal case. The 'stealing a charity' bit is more metaphorical - it wasn't actually stolen, just the control kind of moving from friends of Musk to friends of Altman which was inevitable when Musk quit. I think Musk is alleging unjust enrichment of Altman and Brockman but given they only have a small percentage in the for profit they set up it's going to be hard to prove that's unjust in court I guess. You could argue OpenAI had drifted from its mission to be open.

misiti3780 5mo ago

Who keeps a personal diary in 2026?

deleted 5mo ago
[deleted]
hdndjsbbs 5mo ago
It's actually very helpful! Even just to keep track of what you did and how you were feeling on a given day. I didn't keep one for a long time because I grew up in a household where I didn't feel secure - if I had a journal my parents would have snooped for sure. As I've gotten older I (a) see the value in remembering the past (b) feel more trust in the people around me. Highly recommend trying a journalling habit for a month. It's also very satisfying to do it in a little notebook with a pen instead of typing. It feels more tangible.
THansenite 5mo ago
It is actually a decent sized community. As someone who works in technology, I enjoy the aspect of actually creating something physical when so much is ones and zeros on silicone. While not daily, I try to journal regularly as a practice to slow down, focus my thoughts, and use it as therapy to get frustrations/emotions/musings out so I can move on.
jjulius 5mo ago
I do! It's cathartic and peaceful. :) What's the big deal if people do? Why judge? Why even... care? :)
add-sub-mul-div 5mo ago
Sometimes a sentence can end with a question mark but demonstrate the diametric opposite of curiosity.
- misiti3780 5mo ago
  you going to document this exchange in your diary ? 5/6/2026 Drank a cup of coffee; Made snarky remark to HN user.

THansenite 5mo ago

I honestly don't know how I feel about this. I keep a journal where I can get thoughts out of my head so I can move on. Like the article, its nothing I'd really be ashamed of, but I see it as a kind of personal therapy where I can dump my thoughts. I write with the assumption they are my private thoughts and even I don't have any plans on going back and rereading. I know I'm not a CEO, but even I wouldn't want my private thoughts brought into a courtroom that I never thought would see the light of day.

lesuorac 5mo ago
Yeah, the Framers of the constitution felt the same as you and the 5th amendment used to apply to your belongings as well so a diary you wrote couldn't be used against you.
- bonsai_spool 5mo ago
  > your belongings as well so a diary you wrote couldn't be used against you What's the history around this? And don't these protections only relate to criminal proceedings? edit: seems the parent is referring to the historical entity of the mere evidence rule which isn't the same as saying that the Framers believed a certain interpretation for the 4/5th amendments.
  - JackFr 5mo ago
    The right against self-incrimination is limited in civil trials. Additionally, unlike criminal trials where a jury will be instructed that a defendant's refusal to answer cannot be construed as evidence, there is no such instruction in civil trials, and it is common to argue that a refusal to answer indicates hiding something.
- solomatov 5mo ago
  Could you share links about this? When it turned into a different interpretation?
  - 5mo ago

dmix 5mo ago

> Ultimately, the OpenAI president had to read some of the most embarrassing entries aloud in front of a jury and a packed courthouse, as well as over a YouTube livestream that peaked at around 1,200 viewers. Anyone know which livestream they are talking about? Edit: found it, audio-only and no archive https://www.youtube.com/@USDCCAND/streams https://www.youtube.com/@USDCCAND/streams

skrebbel 5mo ago

Seriously is nothing sacred anymore? Like I think the entirety of OpenAI leadership are scumbags but how is it OK to force someone, anyone, to publish their most private thoughts? EDIT: I sorry read over this part: > OpenAI submitted the journals as evidence in October that was initially sealed and then unsealed in January So they chose to submit it as evidence themselves. I stand corrected, insane move though, why would you submit your own private notes as evidence in a high-stakes court case?

arduanika 5mo ago
> anymore? This is how discovery has always worked. > submitted Doesn't necessarily mean they volunteered it. Either submission or the unsealing could have been in response to a subpoena or court ruling. Maybe the solution is to write at the top of your journal that you are cc'ing your lawyer on it. (Not legal advice!)
- deleted 5mo ago
  [deleted]
- skrebbel 5mo ago
  > > anymore? > This is how discovery has always worked. So if I say a worry to my therapist, and years later I get sued in a civil lawsuit, my opponents can just ask the therapist for their meeting notes and those get submitted and then published on the internet? No, I assume? So then where's the line? I'm no lawyer (in fact I'm a total noob in this area) but seems very weird to me that private notes can just be subpoena'd like that.
  - jwolfe 5mo ago
    Your work laptop documents are not private personal notes. This is also partially why I do not log in to work accounts on personal devices or personal accounts on work devices.
  - eadler 5mo ago
    NAL but generally familiar with law. Medical (and especially therapy) notes, attorney/client communications, and a few other have privilege [1] and you would not /required/ to submit this. If the opposing side requested something that turned them up, and they were responsive, you'd include a response and include a reference in a "privilege log" [0] What is privileged is subtle and often overstated. You can't just put "attorney/client privilege" and CC a lawyer — you need to be asking a genuine legal question. Google almost got in trouble for something like this [2]. Private notes, including diaries, are not privileged. I'd like to see some serious proposals for "diary privilege" but no state has such a rule. [0] https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/creating-privilege-logs-a-best-2761084/ https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/creating-privilege-logs-a-... [1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/privileged_communication https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/privileged_communication [2] https://www.proskauer.com/blog/the-sound-of-silent-attorneys-doj-alleges-google-fakes-attorney-client-privilege-by-ccing-lawyers-who-never-respond https://www.proskauer.com/blog/the-sound-of-silent-attorneys... — although they won later appeals. My point here is that its complicated.

dgellow 5mo ago

> OpenAI submitted the journals as evidence in October that was initially sealed and then unsealed in January. How does that work? How can a company submit a personal journal as evidence? That feels extremely intrusive

jeffwask 5mo ago
He kept them on his work laptop, and they were swept up in discovery. Don't ignore your security team when they talk about data protection and not doing personal business on work devices.
- cogman10 5mo ago
  Even if it were a notebook, it could end up in court. If someone sees you writing in a book and talks about it during discovery, you can end up with a court order to produce that book.
  - bombcar 5mo ago
    Discovery can even be more broad - "provide all written or recorded messages involving this decision" and if you "forget" about your private diary and it's later found out, that's a paddlin'.
    - jeffwask 5mo ago
      Absolutely, they can be but your lawyers at least have a leg to stand on to push for exclusion. If they are just sitting next to the PowerPoint you gave on Tuesday, they will definitely be included.
cogman10 5mo ago
If you learn anything from this, it's that anything you write can ultimately show up in court. You have no right to privacy and your written words, no matter where they are written, are subject to be taken as evidence. Yes it feels intrusive, but it's literally the first thing a lawyer would ask for.

wslh 5mo ago

Privacy and privilege (e.g. attorney/client) are different things, but I'd be curious about the edge cases here: can a personal journal become privileged or protected?

nohell 5mo ago

[flagged]

stevetron 5mo ago

Aside from the disheartening forced-reading of this deeply-personal journal, I've gleaned from it that Musk wanted to bring OpenAI into Tesla, and OpenAI leaders did not. My thought is "OF COURSE" Musk would want to bring it in under his corporate control. I'm glad it didn't.

weinzierl 5mo ago

Would it have helped him if he had encrypted it, or would he have had to reveal it anyway?

SoftTalker 5mo ago
Would he have had to provide it if it were locked in a safe?
bombcar 5mo ago
He would have to reveal it, and refusing to decrypt would be a contempt of court charge, or a "jury, presume that everything in this damn document is the worst you can imagine." This is why politicians don't write things down and can 'never recall'.
j-bos 5mo ago
With a duress password, it could have allowed him to destroy it, but that itself would be illegal and he'd likely be found in contempt of court and probably with some other charges related to tampering with evidence. But he wouldn't have had to have read it in court. IANAL

didip 5mo ago

I know a lot of people use private conversations with chatbot as a replacement to journaling which is a form of self therapy. So… those can be aired willy nilly too then. They are out on public clouds now.

globalnode 5mo ago
have to use a local llm for that if thats how you wish to use them.
- dgellow 5mo ago
  But your local logs can be requested as well
  - bombcar 5mo ago
    You need a rigorous and enforced deletion policy setup years before you get subpoenaed.

poszlem 5mo ago

I cannot believe nobody brought up that episode of The Office with Jan’s deposition. This is both sad and hilarious, just like in the show. https://youtu.be/V3GbCByGltU?si=ctDluaazxGJ-Io81&t=215 https://youtu.be/V3GbCByGltU?si=ctDluaazxGJ-Io81&t=215

brap 5mo ago

I’m too paranoid to write a diary, even a handwritten one, and I’m literally a nobody. It’s beyond me how these super important (and controversial) people keep diaries where they lay out their evil plots like a villain from Scooby Doo. And save it on a work computer.

NordStreamYacht 5mo ago
They do it to keep track of the stories they have told different people.
SoftTalker 5mo ago
Jounaling is a habit of most of the highly successful people I know (granted, that's a single-digit number, so TIFWIW).
Levitz 5mo ago
Journaling is widely recognized as a positive for mental health I think?
joshstrange 5mo ago
> I’m too paranoid to write a diary, even a handwritten one, and I’m literally a nobody. Also a nobody and I feel this. See also: therapy, I'm sure I would/could benefit from it but I have zero trust that those records wouldn't be leaked/stolen/compelled in the future. Especially with the current US government, I wouldn't want a (more of a) record of "wrongthink" (whatever the window shifts to make that in the future).

prosunpraiser 5mo ago

How the hell is it even admissible?

teshier-A 5mo ago

Can't help but notice this is now on the second page of HN (position 42), 37 minutes after being posted with 52 points. I was top 10 when I clicked

dgellow 5mo ago
That just means HN anti-flamewar has been triggered, it’s fairly standard on this site for controversial topics
- AnimalMuppet 5mo ago
  More comments than upvotes. That's at least part of the flamewar detector.
- teshier-A 5mo ago
  I wasn't aware, thank you

deleted 5mo ago

[deleted]

j-bos 5mo ago

If it weren't for it being OpenAI, this story would not be noteworthy. I think a more interesting story is how many commenters on Hacker News have no idea how discovery or privilege works. Interesting blind spot.

1vuio0pswjnm7 5mo ago

"Ultimately, the OpenAI president had to read some of the most embarrassing entries aloud in front of a jury and a packed courthouse, as well as over a YouTube livestream that peaked at around 1,200 viewers." Live audio https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6ZoBSAqmq4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6ZoBSAqmq4

1vuio0pswjnm7 5mo ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eY7wda6U8sg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eY7wda6U8sg
THansenite 5mo ago
I'm imagining a Dungeon Crawler Carl style view-meter that shows more people tuning in as he gets to some juicier parts of his journal. B-b-b-b-b-b-b-osss BATTLE!!!!