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Elon Musk and Grimes hit Met Gala, and jokes fly like rockets

The musician and Tesla/SpaceX CEO are reportedly dating, and may have met because of a Twitter joke about artificial intelligence.

Gael Cooper
CNET editor Gael Fashingbauer Cooper, a journalist and pop-culture junkie, is co-author of "Whatever Happened to Pudding Pops? The Lost Toys, Tastes and Trends of the '70s and '80s," as well as "The Totally Sweet '90s." She's been a journalist since 1989, working at Mpls.St.Paul Magazine, Twin Cities Sidewalk, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, and NBC News Digital. She's Gen X in birthdate, word and deed. If Marathon candy bars ever come back, she'll be first in line.
Expertise Breaking news, entertainment, lifestyle, travel, food, shopping and deals, product reviews, money and finance, video games, pets, history, books, technology history, generational studies. Credentials
  • Co-author of two Gen X pop-culture encyclopedia for Penguin Books. Won "Headline Writer of the Year"​ award for 2017, 2014 and 2013 from the American Copy Editors Society. Won first place in headline writing from the 2013 Society for Features Journalism.
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Gael Cooper
2 min read

Elon Musk just can't stop making headlines. 

On Monday, the SpaceX and CEO attended the Met Gala in New York with Canadian musician and artist Grimes. The Met Gala, formally known as the Costume Institute Gala, is the star-studded annual fundraiser for the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute.

Grimes wore what looked like a choker designed after the Tesla T logo.

The couple have been "quietly dating," the New York Post's Page Six column reported earlier Monday.

Representatives for Musk didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. Grimes didn't immediately respond to a direct message to her Twitter account.

Grimes, who was born Claire Boucher, is working on her fifth album and is known for what AllMusic.com calls "her catchy yet genre-defying approach to music."

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The two may have met thanks to a Twitter joke. The Post reports Musk had planned to tweet a joke about the thought experiment known as Roko's Basilisk, but reached out to Grimes after discovering she had made a similar joke.

"Grimes said this was the first time in three years that anyone understood the joke," an unnamed source told the Post. "They were both poking fun at AI."

Twitter users pointed out some recent online flirting between the two.

The dating report comes after Musk recently grabbed headlines for floating his desire to launch a candy company and that suggesting he'll turn trash into bricks for low-income housing.

With the level of fame of both parties, jokes flew like Falcon rockets.

First published May 7, 4:50 p.m. PT. 
Update, 5:45 p.m. PT: Adds Twitter reaction. 
Update, 6:01 p.m. PT: Adds that the pair attended the Met Gala together. 

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