The board was Altmans boss - this is pretty much their only job. Altman knew this and most likely ignored any questions or concerns of theirs thinking he is the unfireable superstar
Imagine if your boss fired you - and your response was - I’ll come back if you quit! Yeah, no. People might confuse status with those of actual ceo shareholders like zuck, bezos, or musk. But Altman is just another employee
The shareholders can fire the board, but that’s not what he’s asking for. And so far we haven’t heard anything about them getting fired. So mostly this just seems like an egomaniac employee who thinks he is the company (while appropriating the work of some really really smart data scientists)
Going off and starting his own thing would be great, but it would be at least a year to get product out, even if he had all the same players making it. And that's just to catch up to current tech