OpenAI CEO Sam Altman "threw some polite but cutting shade" at Tesla CEO Elon Musk, as Business Insider put it — and Altman's receipts did all the talking.
As is not uncommon nowadays, the tea spill occurred on social media. To be precise, Altman took down Musk on the latter's own platform, X.
On Oct. 30, Altman (@sama) tweeted five words and three screenshots, and without even tagging Musk, he lobbed a powerful, challenging, veiled insult.
A tale in three acts: pic.twitter.com/ClRZBgT24g
— Sam Altman (@sama) October 30, 2025
"A tale in three acts," Altman wrote, using social media parlance for a story told in three images.
In 2018, Altman paid a $45,000 deposit to Tesla for the long-awaited Roadster. In a threaded tweet, he continued.
"I really was excited for the car! And I understand delays. But 7.5 years has felt like a long time to wait," Altman added, sounding eminently reasonable (and likely driving Musk up a wall).
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The Roadster has still not debuted, and Altman wasn't the only person to wonder what exactly happened to his deposit. Earlier this month, major YouTuber Marques Brownlee followed up on a $50,000 payment he made to the electric vehicle manufacturer in 2017 and canceled one of his two preorders.
As recently as August, Tesla claimed the Roadster remained in development.
Altman's tweets came off as relaxed and even-tempered — again, he didn't tag Musk — and the duo were once close friends. As is often the case in Silicon Valley, however, Altman and Musk had clashed, over the direction of OpenAI, with which Musk was once involved.
In 2025, Musk introduced his own chatbot, Grok, to rival OpenAI's ChatGPT. ChatGPT doesn't have a wholly angelic public perception, but Grok has exhibited far more alarming behavior, and the rivalry has exacerbated the bad blood.
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The government 🏛️ Recently, Altman publicly backed a different EV manufacturer — news that arguably reads differently now that we know he's been waiting seven years for a Roadster. Not long after that, Musk's xAI sued OpenAI, alleging the latter poached talent from the former.
Business Insider also quoted Altman's measured comments on Musk from an interview that was published in September.
"For a long time, I looked up to him as … a great jewel for humanity. I have different feelings now," Altman said.
"There are things about him that are incredible, and I'm grateful for a lot of things he's done. There's a lot of things about him that I think are traits I don't admire," he added.
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