According to Futurism, on Tuesday OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was dramatically served a subpoena live onstage while giving a talk in San Francisco with basketball coach Steve Kerr. The incident occurred at the Sydney Goldstein Theater when a man climbed onto the stage and declared he had “a subpoena for Sam Altman” before being loudly booed by the crowd. The man was later confirmed to be an employee of the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office, who said they’d made several prior attempts to serve Altman at OpenAI headquarters and through its online portal. The subpoena orders Altman to appear as a witness in a criminal trial involving activists from the group “Stop AI,” who are on trial for repeatedly blocking OpenAI employees from entering their headquarters during protests in February. Following the public incident, Stop AI claimed responsibility for the subpoena on social media, calling their actions “non-violent protest” against what they describe as OpenAI’s “attempted murder of everyone and every living thing on Earth.”
Stage drama meets legal reality
Here’s the thing about subpoenas – they’re not exactly subtle legal instruments. But this was theater, literally and figuratively. The public defender’s office basically admitted they’d tried the normal routes and got nowhere. So they went for maximum visibility. Can you blame them? When you’re trying to serve one of the most powerful tech CEOs in the world, sometimes you have to get creative. And let’s be honest, Altman‘s team probably knew this was coming. The fact that they couldn’t manage a quieter handoff speaks volumes about the access barriers around tech royalty these days.
Protesters take legal route
Stop AI’s strategy here is actually pretty clever. They’re using the legal system against the very company they’re protesting. Their members are facing criminal charges for those headquarters blockades back in February, and now they’re forcing Altman to testify. The group’s statement is apocalyptic – they literally frame this as putting “the extinction threat that AI poses to humanity” before a jury. But here’s what’s interesting: Altman himself has warned about AI’s existential risks. So we’ve got this bizarre situation where protesters and the CEO they’re protesting actually agree on the potential dangers, just not the solution.
OpenAI’s protest problem
This isn’t some isolated incident for OpenAI. They’ve been dealing with protests for months. Back in July, activists marched on Altman’s home over his political donations. Then there was that whole Sora leak situation where artists accused the company of using them as “PR puppets.” Now we’ve got legal theater playing out on actual theater stages. It’s starting to feel like OpenAI is becoming the tech industry’s protest magnet. And honestly, when you’re building technology that could reshape human civilization, maybe that comes with the territory.
Altman’s awkward position
Think about the irony here. Altman spends years warning about AI risks, then gets subpoenaed by people who say he’s building the very technology that could cause those risks. He can’t exactly argue he hasn’t been warned – he’s been the one doing the warning! Now he’s being forced to testify in a case that will essentially put his own warnings on trial. It’s a legal and PR nightmare wrapped in one very public package. And it all went down in front of a live audience that immediately started booing. Talk about awkward.
