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Comment by gnfargbl | Hacker News Reader

I agree. The author makes the argument that airlines have a terrible business partly because consumers don't have any brand loyalty and Coca-Cola has a wonderful business partly because consumers have brand loyalty. What distinguishes those cases? Why should we consider LLMs to be more like one business or the other?

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Brand loyalty might matter when the cost of a good is relatively low and the availability high. I can basically choose between coke or Pepsi anywhere, and they cost about the same, so why not go with my favorite?

For airlines availability with a preferred carrier is not guaranteed, and prices can vary wildly. Do I have so much brand loyalty that I will pay perhaps 2x the cost? Like most people, I wouldn't.

In terms of availability and cost, LLM providers are much closer to Coke than to an airline.

An article last year said that LLMs quickly become like brands of bottled water

Yes you will pay 2x the cost for your preferred airline when it’s not your money and you are getting reimbursed by your company.

The major airlines very much have brand loyalty via loyalty rewards programs, lounges, and cobranded credit cards.

If you are business traveler gaining status by flying a preferred airline and using other people’s money, you aren’t going to go to the cheapest airline.

Most of the profit from the Big three airlines come from business travel and credit cards

This! I'd argue that the only reason loyalty might not always matter is because I am frequently not given a real choice because a given route likely has a very limited number of airlines offering flights and those might be dramatically different in number of stops, price and times. Air travel is one area where I frequently wonder how many benefits of it being a free market on paper we are actually getting. There is limited choice and direct competition seems limited

One of my semi-frequent routes is between MCO (current home) and ABY - a small airport in Southwest GA where my parents live.

There are only two commercial flights a day, both on Delta and both to ATL. A round trip ticket is $540 for two 1 hour segments (MCO - ATL - ABY).

A round trip ticket from MCO (Orlando) to LAX (Los Angeles) is about the same price

Of course I know the trick for former - book through a partner AirFrance for 17K miles

> What distinguishes those cases?

It's in the article. Making coke is relatively easy compared to running an airline.

> Why should we consider LLMs to be more like one business or the other?

Also in the article. LLM's are analogous to airlines.

You are doing the thing of asking if I read the article without actually directly asking if I read the article. Please don't do that, at least without carefully reading the comment that you're replying to.

My specific point was that the article doesn't appear to support the assertions that it makes about brand loyalty.

I'm simply following the HN guidelines on the subject which prohibit directly asking if people have read the article.

It's a pretty bad guideline in my opinion but my opinion isn't worth shit here.

I'll re-read your comment when I have more time. Sorry if I missed the point.

Most people who bother to comment on HN have an interesting opinion, and I value yours.

The point of that guideline is to ensure that the conversation is substantive. Repeating points from the article with an assertion that those points are indeed in the article doesn't really add to the conversation and it's something that I do find frustrating on HN, which is why I mentioned it. I agree that it isn't a great guideline.

they say running an airline is easy, that's why you're easily underpriced

that should also apply to drinks, in which case coke should be underpriced by pepsi

and it should also happen to every other category of beverage

the author's argument falls apart as soon as you talk about something that's not the brand Coca Cola

is Coca Cola the exception here?

"industry structure" should be about the industry, so this should mean other beverages like tea and water should also be strong industries?

but no they're not, they're terrible just like airlines

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