6 ms·

> But make no mistake, they have a moat and it is strong. Given that Mistral, Llama, Claude, and even Gemini are competitive with (if not better than) OpenAI's

by dvt 2y ago

> But make no mistake, they have a moat and it is strong. Given that Mistral, Llama, Claude, and even Gemini are competitive with (if not better than) OpenAI's flagships, I don't really think this is true.

crowcroft 2y ago
Inertia is a hell of a moat. Everyone building is comfortable with OpenAI's API, and have an account. Competing models can't just be as good, they need to be MUCH better to be worth switching. Even as competitors build a sort of compatibility layer to be plug an play with OpenAI they will always be a step behind at best every time OpenAI releases a new feature.
- chadash 2y ago
  Only a small fraction of all future AI projects have even gotten started. So they aren't only fighting over what's out there now, they're fighting over what will emerge.
  - phillipcarter 2y ago
    This is true, and yet, many orgs who have experimented with OpenAI and are likely to return to them when a project "becomes real". When you google around online for how to do XYZ thing using LLMs, OpenAI is usually in whatever web results you read. Other models and APIs are also now using OpenAI's API format since it's the apparent winner. And for anyone who's already sent out subprocessor notifications with them as a vendor, they're locked in. This isn't to say it's only going to be an OpenAI market. Enterprise worlds move differently, such as those in G Cloud who will buy a few million $$ of Vertex expecting to "figure out that gemini stuff later". In that sense, Google has a moat with those slices of their customers. But I believe that when people think OpenAI has no moat because "the models will be a commodity", I think that's (a) some wishful thinking about the models and (b) doesn't consider the sociological factors that matter a lot more than how powerful a model is or where it runs.
phillipcarter 2y ago
There are countless tools competitive with or better than what I use for email, and yet I still stick with my email client. Same is true for many, many other tools I use. I could perhaps go out of my way to make sure I'm always using the most technically capable and easy-to-use tools for everything, but I don't, because I know how to use what I have. This is the exact dynamic that gives OpenAI a moat. And it certainly doesn't hurt them that they still produce SOTA models.
- dontlikeyoueith 2y ago
  That is not what anyone means when they talk about moats.
  - phillipcarter 2y ago
    I'm someone, and that's one of the ways I define a moat.
    - calmoo 2y ago
      First mover advantage is not a great moat.
    - dontlikeyoueith 2y ago
      > I'm someone Asserting facts not in evidence, as they say.
- calmoo 2y ago
  Yeah but the lock-in wrt email is absolutely huge compared to chatting with an LLM. I can (and have) easily ended my subscription to ChatGPT and switched to Claude, because it provides much more value to me at roughly the same cost. Switching email providers will, in general, not provide that much value to me and cause a large headache for me to switch. Switching LLMs right now can be compared to switching electricity providers or mobile carriers - generally it's pretty low friction and provides immediate benefit (in the case of electricity and mobile, the benefit is cost). You simply cannot compare it to an email provider.

by dvt 2y ago

crowcroft 2y ago

Inertia is a hell of a moat. Everyone building is comfortable with OpenAI's API, and have an account. Competing models can't just be as good, they need to be MUCH better to be worth switching. Even as competitors build a sort of compatibility layer to be plug an play with OpenAI they will always be a step behind at best every time OpenAI releases a new feature.

chadash 2y ago
Only a small fraction of all future AI projects have even gotten started. So they aren't only fighting over what's out there now, they're fighting over what will emerge.
- phillipcarter 2y ago
  This is true, and yet, many orgs who have experimented with OpenAI and are likely to return to them when a project "becomes real". When you google around online for how to do XYZ thing using LLMs, OpenAI is usually in whatever web results you read. Other models and APIs are also now using OpenAI's API format since it's the apparent winner. And for anyone who's already sent out subprocessor notifications with them as a vendor, they're locked in. This isn't to say it's only going to be an OpenAI market. Enterprise worlds move differently, such as those in G Cloud who will buy a few million $$ of Vertex expecting to "figure out that gemini stuff later". In that sense, Google has a moat with those slices of their customers. But I believe that when people think OpenAI has no moat because "the models will be a commodity", I think that's (a) some wishful thinking about the models and (b) doesn't consider the sociological factors that matter a lot more than how powerful a model is or where it runs.

phillipcarter 2y ago

There are countless tools competitive with or better than what I use for email, and yet I still stick with my email client. Same is true for many, many other tools I use. I could perhaps go out of my way to make sure I'm always using the most technically capable and easy-to-use tools for everything, but I don't, because I know how to use what I have. This is the exact dynamic that gives OpenAI a moat. And it certainly doesn't hurt them that they still produce SOTA models.

dontlikeyoueith 2y ago
That is not what anyone means when they talk about moats.
- phillipcarter 2y ago
  I'm someone, and that's one of the ways I define a moat.
  - calmoo 2y ago
    First mover advantage is not a great moat.
  - dontlikeyoueith 2y ago
    > I'm someone Asserting facts not in evidence, as they say.
calmoo 2y ago
Yeah but the lock-in wrt email is absolutely huge compared to chatting with an LLM. I can (and have) easily ended my subscription to ChatGPT and switched to Claude, because it provides much more value to me at roughly the same cost. Switching email providers will, in general, not provide that much value to me and cause a large headache for me to switch. Switching LLMs right now can be compared to switching electricity providers or mobile carriers - generally it's pretty low friction and provides immediate benefit (in the case of electricity and mobile, the benefit is cost). You simply cannot compare it to an email provider.