xAI Engineer Resigns Over Grok 3 Ranking Dispute, Sparking Free Speech Debate

AI engineer gets the boot: Elon Musk's AI firm xAI fires techie for leaking secrets about new model

In a surprising turn of events, xAI, the "anti-woke" AI company founded by billionaire Elon Musk, has fired one of its engineers for sharing his personal opinion about the company's unreleased AI model, as per a report. According to Futurism, Benjamin De Kraker, a long-time AI developer, took to X (formerly Twitter) to reveal that he was ordered to delete a post where he ranked Grok 3, an upcoming AI model from xAI, lower than OpenAI's current coding AI. De Kraker's post was essentially a harmless opinion, where he openly discussed his thoughts on Grok 3's capabilities compared to the competition, reported Futurism. However, his superiors at xAI reportedly demanded that he remove the post, claiming that even mentioning the model's name, "Grok 3 - TBD," was a violation of company confidentiality, despite Musk himself having teased the model publicly over a month ago, as per the report. In his post, De Kraker wrote "After reviewing everything and thinking a lot, I've decided that I'm not going to delete the post," as quoted by Futurism. He also explained that there was nothing controversial about his opinion. De Kraker claimed, "It's just a harmless personal opinion," quoted the report. The engineer speculated that the issue might have stemmed from his honest evaluation of Grok 3's capabilities, implying that xAI wasn't happy with his take, especially since he had openly labelled it as "to be determined" in his post. Despite his efforts to support the company's success, De Kraker expressed disappointment with xAI's decision to fire him over what he called "a clearly labelled opinion." He pointed out the irony of a company that claims to champion free speech taking such a drastic step. De Kraker wrote that "a company purporting to champion free speech would try to fire a low-level employee over a clearly labelled opinion that contains absolutely nothing controversial." According to Futurism, Elon Musk himself chimed in briefly, calling the situation "weird" after De Kraker shared the news on X, though it seems no further actions were taken to resolve the issue. While Musk's firm is known for its controversial takes on free speech, De Kraker's dismissal highlights the apparent gap between the company's claims and its practices, raising questions about the true nature of "free speech absolutism" in the world of AI innovation, as per Futurism. Why did xAI fire Benjamin De Kraker? xAI dismissed Benjamin De Kraker after he shared a post on X (formerly Twitter) where he expressed his opinion about the upcoming AI model, Grok 3. The company demanded that he delete the post, citing confidentiality concerns, though Musk had previously teased the model publicly. Is there any update on De Kraker's situation? After Musk's brief comment, there has been no further update on De Kraker's case, leaving his future with xAI unclear. It's unknown whether Musk stepped in to give his job back or if De Kraker refused to join back.

Elon Musk's AI Company Just Sacked an Engineer for Posting About Its Upcoming AI Model

An "anti-woke" AI company founded by chronic poster Elon Musk has forced one of its engineers to resign for, essentially, posting. That engineer, Benjamin De Kraker, said in a lengthy X post that he'd been told he needed to either delete a post ranking the still-unreleased model lower than OpenAI's offering for writing code -- or face termination. "After reviewing everything and thinking a lot, I've decided that I'm not going to delete the post," the longtime AI dev said, "which is very clearly a harmless personal opinion." As De Kraker explained, xAI claimed that it asked the engineer to delete his post because he'd publicly referenced the forthcoming model -- despite Musk announcing it on the same platform more than a month prior. "Their official demand said that even writing 'Grok 3 - TBD' is somehow 'confidential information,'" he wrote. "This is absolutely absurd, since it's repeatedly been acknowledged by the company and its famous CEO." Reading between the lines, however, it seems the firing threat may have been leveled because he had been honest about Grok 3's current capabilities when stacking it up against OpenAI and others. "Are they mad that my clearly-labeled opinion didn't guess that the still-unreleased Grok 3 will be higher? Maybe. Probably," he wrote. "Again, maybe it is at the top, I genuinely don't know. That's why it says 'to be determined.'" Despite still hoping the poster-in-chief and his AI company "win," De Kraker said it was "very disappointing" that a company purporting to champion free speech "would try to fire a low-level employee over a clearly-labeled opinion that contains absolutely nothing controversial." "But here we are," he wrote. As if the situation wasn't already bizarre enough, Musk made it all the stranger by wading into the debate himself. "That's weird," the X owner replied. In response, De Kraker agreed that it was, indeed, "pretty weird." Despite that acknowledgment from the world's richest poster, there has been no further update about De Kraker's case, suggesting that Musk didn't maneuver to get him his job back (or, perhaps, that the engineer refused). We can't say we're exactly surprised, but it's definitely another bit of evidence that the gastrointestinally-challenged billionaire's avowed "free speech absolutism" seldom holds up in practice.

"Delete the tweet or you're out!" xAI Engineer claims he was forced to resign over Grok 3 post

Benjamin De Kraker, an AI engineer at xAI, resigned after being given an ultimatum to delete a social media post ranking AI models, including the yet-to-be-released Grok 3. He refused, criticising xAI's leadership for curbing free speech despite its public stance on openness. His resignation comes as xAI aggressively expands hiring to compete with OpenAI, Google, and Meta in the fast-evolving AI sector.An AI engineer at Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company, xAI, has resigned after being asked to remove a social media post that included a ranking of various AI models, including the company's unreleased Grok 3. Benjamin De Kraker chose to leave instead of complying with the directive. De Kraker had posted a personal ranking of AI models based on coding capabilities. His list included: Although the ranking was explicitly labelled as his opinion, xAI considered it a breach of confidentiality, despite the fact that both the company and Musk had publicly acknowledged Grok 3's development multiple times. In his resignation post on X (formerly Twitter), De Kraker shared his disbelief over xAI's decision. "I wish I was joking. I'm not. That's the reason -- the fact that I wrote 'Grok 3 (TBD)' is grounds for being fired." He further pointed out the contradiction in xAI's decision. "But wait, hasn't Grok 3 been officially acknowledged by xAI? Yes. Yes, it has." To support his claim, he shared links to official xAI statements and Musk's posts discussing the model. De Kraker took a swipe at xAI's leadership, highlighting the apparent contradiction between the company's proclaimed commitment to free speech and its internal policies. "It's very disappointing to me that a company and leaders who supposedly champion free speech and openness would try to fire a low-level employee over a clearly labelled opinion that contains absolutely nothing controversial, but here we are." Despite his frustration, he expressed admiration for his former colleagues and wished the company well. "The specific feature of Grok I spent the majority of my time working on with a really hard-working team is very cool, and I hope it works extremely well for everyone," he wrote, adding that he would not disclose any actual confidential information. De Kraker made it clear that his decision to resign was about standing by his principles. "I thought about just deleting the damn thing... But you know, once you start caving and giving up holding mild personal opinions, the slope becomes very slippery. I'll keep my speech and dignity and get another job, or build one. Catch ya on the flip side." His resignation comes as xAI aggressively expands its workforce in a bid to compete with OpenAI, Google, and Meta. The company is reportedly planning to hire thousands of workers this year, focusing on training its chatbot, Grok. Job listings suggest xAI is seeking bilingual employees and specialists in law and STEM fields. Internal records indicate that the company currently employs over 900 AI tutors -- data annotators essential for AI training. Many of these hires were made ahead of the 2024 US presidential election, reflecting the growing role of AI in shaping public discourse. Elon Musk has positioned xAI as a direct competitor to OpenAI, an organisation he co-founded but later distanced himself from. Recently, he spearheaded a $97.4 billion bid to acquire OpenAI, arguing that the move was necessary to restore its original open-source mission. However, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman dismissed the offer outright, stating, "The company is not for sale." He suggested that Musk's move was more about disrupting OpenAI's progress than making a legitimate acquisition attempt. "I think he's probably just trying to slow us down," Altman told Bloomberg. "He's obviously a competitor. He's working hard, and he's raised a lot of money for xAI." In a separate interview at the Paris AI Action Summit, Altman made a personal remark about Musk, questioning his motivations. "Probably his whole life is from a position of insecurity," Altman said. "I feel for the guy. I really do. Actually, I don't think he's a happy person." De Kraker's resignation highlights broader tensions in the AI industry, where secrecy, competition, and corporate policies on employee speech often clash. While companies guard their AI developments closely, employees expect the right to express personal opinions -- especially on widely discussed topics. His case raises the question: where should companies draw the line between protecting proprietary information and allowing individual expression? For now, De Kraker has made his choice, and the AI industry continues to evolve at breakneck speed.

xAI engineer quits after post on Grok 3 AI ranking

An AI engineer has resigned from xAI, the AI startup founded by Elon Musk, after refusing to delete a social media post ranking AI models, including xAI's upcoming Grok 3. On Feb. 12, Benjamin DeKraker announced his untimely resignation from xAI after six months working for the Human Data team building Grok models. His decision followed a dispute over an X post, where he expressed his personal ranking of AI models based on their coding capabilities. xAI claims Grok 3 post violated confidentiality In the post, DeKraker ranked the yet-to-be-released Grok 3 below several OpenAI ChatGPT models. XAI reportedly told him that the post contained confidential information and asked him to remove it. "I either had to delete the post quoted below, or face being fired, DeKraker wrote, adding: "After reviewing everything and thinking a lot, I've decided that I'm not going to delete the post -- which is very clearly a harmless personal opinion." Elon Musk previously promoted Grok 3, stating on Jan. 3 that pretraining for the model had been completed with "10X more compute than Grok 2." Related: Musk again asks to block OpenAI's 'illegal' conversion to for-profit model According to DeKraker, the Musk-founded AI startup said that writing "Grok 3 - to be determined (TBD)" was considered leaking of "confidential information." Musk previously marketed Grok 3 capabilities Check out Cointelegraph's detailed guide to learn more about Grok AI, Elon Musk's answer to ChatGPT. "The post they wanted me to remove is 100% just my personal opinion," DeKraker said while explaining his decision to resign rather than delete a post on X. The social media platform has become known for its promotion of free speech since Musk bought it in 2022. However, some community members sided with xAI, arguing that internal employees should not undermine a company's unreleased products. XAI's ultimatum to its employee for an X post comes amid a power struggle between OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Musk. On Feb. 10, a Musk-led group of investors reportedly offered $97.4 billion to buy OpenAI. In response, Altman refused and offered a counteroffer of $9.74 billion to buy X, which Musk had acquired in 2022 for $44 billion.

Elon Musk Claims Grok 3 Outperforms All Chatbots After xAI Engineer Resigns Over AI Ranking Dispute

De Kraker claimed his employer asked him to remove the post or face being fired. Speaking at the Dubai World Governments Summit on Thursday, Feb. 13, Elon Musk said xAI's Grok 3 outperforms all other chatbots on the market. However, that claim is disputed by one of xAI's own engineers, who said he was recently forced out for ranking Grok behind other leading AI models on social media. Musk Discusses Grok 3 Asked by Emirati State Minister for AI Omar Sultan Al Olama what to expect from the upcoming Grok 3 model, Musk boasted that it was "scary smart" with "very powerful reasoning capabilities." "In the tests we've done so far," he claimed, "Grok 3 is outperforming anything that's been released." Giving a rare glimpse into xAI's development process, Musk said the unreleased chatbot was "trained on a lot of synthetic data." He also hinted at novel data processing techniques aimed at achieving "logical consistency." xAI Engineer Ranks Grok3 Below OpenAI Models In an X post on Feb.8, Benjamin De Kraker, who worked on the human data team for Grok development, discussed his opinion on the top AI models for code. In De Kraker's view, OpenAI's o1-pro, o1 and o3-mini are all tied for the top spot. He placed the unreleased Grok 3 in fourth position, followed by DeepSeek R1 and GPT4o. "Delete the Post or Face Being Fired" On Thursday, Feb. 12, De Kraker issued a follow-up post in which he claimed, "xAI told me I either had to delete [the post] or face being fired." Facing such an ultimatum, De Kraker said he decided to retain his "free speech and dignity" and resign. "It's very disappointing to me that a company and leaders who supposedly champion free speech and openness would try to fire a low-level employee over a clearly-labeled opinion that contains absolutely nothing controversial," he added. De Kraker's predicament hasn't gone unnoticed by xAI's top brass. Commenting on the most recent post, CEO Musk said, "that's weird." However, he didn't indicate whether he planned to intervene or not.