OpenAI in talks for share sale valuing ChatGPT maker at $500B | Hacker News Reader

OpenAI in talks for share sale valuing ChatGPT maker at $500B

ft.com

21 pointsViktorRay13 comments

Stake in the ground , as smart phones did ; chargpt will make future dumber + once parasitic dependancy goal accomplished

Schools/ universities getting obliterated student performace tanking. Their mission is parasitic dependence induction "helping the masses" .

Like Google they have successfully pulled the football from Charlie brown on any responsibility over the quality of information provided ... all the other llms are just mirrors of chatgpt conception of an ai interaction experience ... they just announced it gov grants openai perpetual subscription $ fee from every federal employees (so they would be collecting as the employer all of the employees internal deliberations as chatgpt logs which court stated could not be deleted) , it really feels like they are trying to digitize the teachers union lock on student thought and automate out white collar wealth that nip at the heels of capital class).

I really wonder how this factors into the equity calculation for anyone joining past this point. You either need them to grow into the valuation or hope to be able to sell on the secondary market.

Cash up front please.

They are about to hit 700M weekly active users. That's approaching Facebook order of magnitude market penetration. Of course they have a ridiculous infra OPEX, but the user data alone is probably worth a good chunk to anyone should it ever come to a sell-off. And should they ever start profit-squeezing, it'll be a gigantic gold mine. At this point I'd be much more worried about investing in the smaller competitors like Anthropic, who run on a tiny fraction of the user base. There's basically nothing of value there if they ever get toppled on the tech side.

The issue comes down to AD revenue. In the end that’s where the bread and butter comes in. Would you trust an AI that is based around AD revenue? I sure as hell wouldn’t.

Imagine AI that pushes for more engagement. Instead of getting what you want the first time it takes 4-5 times in small chunks to get the full scope of what you asked.

Paid service would be an AI I can trust.

Not just AD rev. Behavior mod rev.

Precisely. It's important to understand what modern digital advertising really is: Population-scale digital pimping. They put your ass on the RTB street to turn tricks. You get mindfucked by--and maybe catch some viruses from--any John who wants to take a crack at you. In return, you get this nice cheap TV/Youtube/Gmail/article.

Now imagine the value of ChatGPT with a similar mindfucking-as-a-service business model. People are using ChatGPT as therapists, virtual partners, an always-reaffirming and helpful companion. They aren't just exposed fleetingly to ads, they're in bed with them, anthropomorphizing them, "talking" to them more than they talk to their own mother. The opportunity to exert influence over the bitch's behavior and thought patterns is an astronomical-scale goldmine.

Population-scale digital pimping is worth trillions. How much is population-scale digital grooming worth?

People love scrolling through tiktok and instagram videos of “influencers” advertising stuff. For hours and hours. Each day.

The question isn’t would HN’s readers trust AI that incorporates advertising. The question is will the broad populace. And I would bet yes.

Yup most people just want fats, sugars, salts, etc. And dopamine, especially dopamine.

Funny ha ha thing good. Thinking dealing with problem bad. My tribe good. Your tribe bad.

You’re looking at this like business to consumer but there’s plenty of money to be made selling services to professionals and businesses. Those $100 and $200 plans, along with API access, are not being sold to regular consumers.

And Claude Code is _everywhere_ (ironically that also means inside OpenAI)

If you assume that 5% of active users have a plus plan, that is $700M per month. They'd need to sell several million pro plans to reach that level in a B2B setting. They might eventually, but right now I doubt there are enough companies with enough relevant workers to take them up on that.

The combined property of ten football stadiums filled with millionaires seems like a lot for some special 1s and 0s.

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