> Microsoft, Google or even OpenAI today.

Probably an unrelated question, but why the "or even" caveat for OpenAI? They claimed to be an open non-profit, cynicism seems warranted at a level even moreso than Microsoft and Google.

You are right but for OpenAI there could exist in principle a strategy of beating the cynicism out of them by holding them to their word. I might have wanted to encourage people to be optimistic about that.

Who would do the beating there though? And why would OpenAI actually care to stick to their word?

The whole CEO debacle seemed to make it pretty clear to me that OpenAI wasn't interested in being open or non-profit.

Elon might have stuck to his lawsuit, or someone like PG could come out strongly against Altman, but you might need someone of Mervin Kelly's stature and an army of lawyers to do it. Maybe Fei-Fei Li after she has earned her startup cred (so that the suits and politicians have the chance to take a technical leader seriously, put her on the board in place of Larry Summers, e.g.)

What's the ideal end acenario if someone does successfully smack them back down to stand by their original promises? And what's the worst case scenario if no one stands up to them?

It might be better for one's sanity to start looking at what people and orgs do instead of what they say or what others imagine/hope they do. It's a business and and the end of the day has to return all the money Microsoft invested in it. Ethics is what toilet rolls are made of at large corps.

Today, maybe, but I doubt you could have said that of Bell Labs, at least by Occam's razor. (Maybe they weren't a business all by themselves, but their output was effectively deployed to the parent concern by most standards)

While the current behavior likely is a consequence of the approach then. Their corporate lawyers don't want those legal aspects of the Unix wars, again and created their moat.

It's always interesting to read how many of the silicon valley startups were founded by people who had IP they'd developed at existing companies where they were told "we're not going to sell this feel free to take it and start a company". I feel like large companies are more reflexive about holding onto IP these days.