I don't think this is what really happened at all. The reason this decision was made was because 95% of employees sided with Sam on this issue, and the board didn't explain themselves in any way at all. So it was Sam + 95% of employees + All investors against the board. In which case the board should lose (since they are only governing for themselves here).
I think in the end a good and fair outcome. I still think their governing structure is decent to solve the AGI problem, this particular board was just really bad.
It is sort of strange that our communal reaction is to say "well this board didn't act anything like a normal corporate board": of course it didn't, that was indeed the whole point of not having a normal corporate board in charge.
Whatever you think of Sam, Adam, Ilya etc, the one conclusion that seems safe to reach is that in the end, the profit/financial incentives ended up being far more important than the NGOs mission, no matter what legal structure was in place.