OpenAI has gone from ruling the world of artificial intelligence with ChatGPT to chaos, its chief executive ousted seemingly for advancing too fast and too far with the risky technology.

The exit of Sam Altman set in motion a series of events that saw the upstart company's biggest investor, Microsoft, swoop in to hire the toppled CEO and begin a process of building an OpenAI clone in the Redmond, Washington-based tech giant.

In some ways, the looming result to the weekend saga is hardly a surprise, with many wondering how the board members could be naive enough to think they could win the duel with the Microsoft-backed Altman.