OpenAI Pulls Promotional Materials About Jony Ive Deal (After Trademark Lawsuit)

OpenAI appears to have pulled a much-discussed video promoting the friendship between CEO Sam Altman and legendary Apple designer Jony Ive (plus, incidentally, OpenAI's $6.5 billion deal to acquire Ive and Altman's device startup io) from its website and YouTube page. [Though you can still see the original on Archive.org.]

Does that suggest something is amiss with the acquisition, or with plans for Ive to lead design work at OpenAI? Not exactly, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, who reports [on X.com] that the 'deal is on track and has NOT dissolved or anything of the sort.' Instead, he said a judge has issued a restraining order over the io name, forcing the company to pull all materials that used it.

Gurman elaborates on the disappearance of the video (and other related marketing materials) in a new article at Bloomberg:

Bloomberg reported last week that a judge was considering barring OpenAI from using the IO name due to a lawsuit recently filed by the similarly named IYO Inc., which is also building AI devices. 'This is an utterly baseless complaint and we'll fight it vigorously,' a spokesperson for Ive said on Sunday.

The video is still viewable on X.com, notes TechCrunch. But visiting the 'Sam and Jony' page on OpenAI now pulls up a 404 error message — written in the form of a haiku:

Ghost of code lingers
Blank space now invites wonder
Thoughts begin to soar
by o4-mini-high

Read more of this story at Slashdot.