The Kendrick-Drake beef for people whose favorite book is Sapiens just got juicier. Sam Altman is now warding off an unsolicited offer to buy OpenAI for $97.4 billion that Elon Musk and a group of investors extended earlier this week.

Altman rebuffed it faster than a tech bro can work AGI into a conversation. Personal shots were fired, with Altman musing that Musk is an insecure, unhappy person and calling the Tesla CEO’s bid an attempt to slow progress at OpenAI (Altman also noted that Musk runs a competing startup, xAI).

While a grinning Musk might not be about to carry a sink into OpenAI’s HQ, the proposition could throw a wrench into Altman’s plans to spin off the for-profit ChatGPT-maker from its nonprofit parent organization.

Headache for Altman

The two tech moguls have been squabbling for some time: In 2015, a group including both of them co-founded OpenAI, but Musk left following a power struggle a few years later. He recently fired off a volley of lawsuits against OpenAI, accusing it of veering from its original nonprofit mission.

Now, Musk claims the nonprofit would benefit from a buyout:

• Musk’s lawyer says his client aims to acquire it to help it “return to the open-source, safety-focused force for good it once was.”
• A letter Musk and a group of co-investors sent to OpenAI’s board makes the case that the nonprofit deserves to be paid a fair price if it does give up its for-profit subsidiary.

The offer comes as OpenAI is reportedly close to raising $40 billion from SoftBank at a $300 billion valuation.

Even if the board rejects Musk’s ~$97 billion offer, it could still drive up the stake in the company that Altman and co. will have to give the nonprofit in exchange for relinquishing control—which would cut into the equity it can offer investors like Microsoft.

Unlike a for-profit company…which prioritizes shareholder value, legal experts say OpenAI’s nonprofit board has to weigh any acquisition offer based on compatibility with its mission.—SK

Takeaways from JPow’s Senate testimony. Federal Reserve Chair and famed Deadhead Jerome Powell spoke to the Senate Banking Committee yesterday as part of his semiannual address to Congress—and he said a lot without saying much. He...1) confirmed the Fed is in no hurry to cut interest rates again 2) encouraged lawmakers to cut the deficit 3) acknowledged it’s “possible” Trump’s tariffs will worsen inflation 4) denied the Fed will develop its own digital currency as long as he’s in charge and 5) defended his staff, saying they’re “overworked,” not overstaffed.

Deloitte told some US consultants to remove pronouns from their emails. Employees working on government contracts were asked to take gender pronouns out of their email signatures “to align with emerging government client practices and requirements,” the Financial Times reported. The Big Four firm also told US workers it would “sunset” its DEI goals, though its UK branch reportedly doubled down on diversity programs. The moves come after President Trump ordered federal agencies to ban the use of “gender ideology” in their communications.

🚙 Ford CEO says tariffs could “blow a hole” in the auto industry. Today’s panicked tariffs quote goes to Ford Motor CEO Jim Farley, who said President Trump’s plan to impose 25% tariffs on steel and aluminum is already sowing “chaos” in the car industry. Though most of Ford’s steel is sourced in the US, some of its suppliers source the materials from abroad, which Farley said could hurt costs, CNBC reported. In other tariff news, Coca-Cola might start selling more drinks in plastic bottles, since it imports the aluminum in its soda cans from Canada.—AE

The apparel website belonging to the artist formerly known as Kanye West was disabled by Shopify yesterday after selling nothing but a t-shirt bearing the Nazi symbol for more than 24 hours.

It all started with the Super Bowl. Toward the end of the game, Ye’s face appeared on-screen in some markets for a 30-second ad, seemingly recorded via iPhone from a dentist’s chair. “Um…um…go to yeezy.com,” he said in the spot, which aired in cities including Los Angeles, Atlanta, and Philadelphia, according to the Washington Post.

• Within an hour of the commercial airing, Ye’s website wiped its normal inventory to feature only one new product: A $20 t-shirt with a swastika on the front, labeled as “HH-01,” Variety reported.
• Almost two hours after Philadelphia finished routing Kansas City, the ad ran again, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

Shopify kept Ye’s online store open for orders through Monday, drawing widespread online condemnation, before it took the site offline Tuesday morning, citing a violation of its terms.

This isn’t Shopify’s first scandal: Despite monthslong public outrage, another Shopify-powered store that sells Holocaust denial merch is still active. Shopify, a ~$160 billion e-commerce giant that underpins online shopping for retailers from Allbirds to Heinz, removed a ban on “hateful content” from its user policies last year.—ML

People who love books tend to have strong opinions about them, so it should come as no surprise that the book publishing world is in a spirited discussion over the fate of book blurbs.

Blurbs are the positive reviews on a book cover intended to let you know that someone famous has read that book and thinks it’s “dazzling,” “illuminating,” or even “spellbinding.” But the practice is facing renewed scrutiny after the head of Simon & Schuster’s US imprint, Sean Manning, said the publishing house will no longer require authors to get blurbs for their books.

The chief complaint? Manning said the blurbs reward “connections over talent.” Authors consider them to be time-consuming and a pain—both for the writer requesting a blurb, and for the author tasked with producing one.

Yet…some parties in the book world, namely booksellers and book reviewers, rely on blurbs to sort through the piles of books asking for attention.

Zoom out: The fracas around blurbs is symbolic of the teetering industry, where marketing budgets are shrinking and publishers try any way they can to get their books top-billing.—CC

If it feels like everyone you know is wheezing all over the place, you’re probably right. The percentage of doctor visits due to flu-like symptoms last week was higher than the peak of any flu season since 2010, according to data from the CDC, which estimates there have been at least 24 million cases of influenza (and 13,000 deaths) this winter season.

Experts aren’t 100% sure why it’s worse than usual, but they have a few guesses. It’s possible the strain of flu going around right now is just more intense than past versions. Americans might also be taking fewer precautionary measures this winter, especially as Covid cases have eased. To avoid the flu, doctors recommend washing your hands with soap and water, avoiding touching your mouth, nose, and eyes, and—this part is important—not licking any door handles.—AE