A feud between two of the world’s most powerful men got messy this week when X CEO Elon Musk and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman accused each other of manipulating the tech industries to their advantage.
Musk kicked off the drama Monday when he claimed Apple was promoting OpenAI’s ChatGPT on the App Store over his own AI chatbot, Grok. But Altman hit back by claiming Musk manipulates X to benefit himself and harm competitors.
Things escalated Tuesday when Altman’s response garnered 3 million views. Musk posted on X: “You got 3M views on your bulls— post, you liar, far more than I’ve received on many of mine, despite me having 50 times your follower count!”
🍿🍿🍿 pic.twitter.com/XwoFh3n1eV
— Ginger Gaetz (@GingerLGaetz) August 12, 2025
Musk added: “The immensity of the irony of Scam Altman complaining about ‘suppression’ on this platform while simultaneously getting millions of views is too much to bear.”
Altman then challenged Musk: “Will you sign an affidavit that you have never directed changes to the X algorithm in a way that has hurt your competitors or helped your own companies? I will apologize if so.”
The high-stakes battle between two of the biggest players in the tech world began Monday when Musk threatened legal action against Apple.
“Apple is behaving in a manner that makes it impossible for any AI company besides OpenAI to reach #1 in the App store, which is an unequivocal antitrust violation,” he posted. “xAI will take immediate legal action.”
The immensity of the irony of Scam Altman complaining about “suppression” on this platform while simultaneously getting millions of views is too much to bear
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 12, 2025
He also called out the Apple App Store for refusing to put X or Grok in their “Must Have” section despite their high rankings.
“Are you playing politics? What gives? Inquiring minds want to know,” he wrote. “And why is ChatGPT literally in every list where you have editorial control?”
And why is ChatGPT literally in every list where you have editorial control?
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 12, 2025
Altman was quick to express his skepticism. “This is a remarkable claim given what I have heard alleged that Elon does to manipulate X to benefit himself and his own companies and harm his competitors and people he doesn’t like,” he posted.
Currently, ChatGPT is the top free app on the App Store, with Grok in fifth place and Google’s Gemini chatbot much lower at 57th.
Musk and Altman have had bad blood for years. In fact, Musk co-founded OpenAI in 2015 but left its board in 2018. He is now suing Altman and the company and claiming they have strayed too far from their original aim of creating AI for everyone.
In February, Musk’s $97.4 billion bid to take control of OpenAI failed.
The post Musk and ‘Scam’ Altman Go Head to Head: ‘Bulls— Post’ appeared first on The Daily Beast.
