I'm surprised by your impression that there are people "currently in the driving seat of how, when and where this tech gets used". I think we are in the grip o

I'm surprised by your impression that there are people "currently in the driving seat of how, when and where this tech gets used". I think we are in the grip of a wonderful, highly creative dis-order. The most comparable moment in my lifetime was the late 90s, where the inevitability and transformative power of the Internet (through the web) became mainstream over a couple of years. This time that transition seems to be taking weeks! And yet, it is FAR more broadly accessible than the Web was in the late 90s. In America at least, where 85% of individuals have smart phones, ChatGPT is instantly accessible to a huge portion of the population. And unlike other advances it doesn't require specialized expertise to begin extracting value. Meanwhile, LLM owners are being compelled by competition to continue offering services for free and release research into the public domain. The engineering advances that power their platforms face a sideways challenge from research like LORA that makes them less relevant. And because the training data and methods are ubiquitous, public institutions of many kinds can potentially build their own LLMs if rents get too high. Outside the runaway-superintelligence scenario, the current accessibility of LLMs is one of the best ways this could have played out. I'm afraid those attempting to slow research will be unwitting accomplices for people who use the opportunity to reduce competition and consolidate power over the new technology.