Comment by theptip

I think this misses a crucial dynamic. It’s not “custom scaffolding vs. wait for better models”. There is also fine-tuning.

In specialized domains you can’t just rely on OpenAI finding all the training data required to render your experts obsolete.

If you can build a data flywheel you can fine-tune models and build that lead into a moat; whoever has the best training set will have the best product. In the short term you might start fine-tuning on OpenAI but once you’ve established your dataset you can potentially gain independence by moving onto OSS models.

If you are building a software assistant, sure, this is clearly something that OpenAI will get better at very quickly, and Altman has commented as much that many companies are building things which are certain to get steamrolled by core product development. But I think there is a very interesting strategic question around areas like law, medicine, and probably more so niche technical areas, where OpenAI will/can not absorb knowledge as quickly.