[lvl155]

Barrier to entry is actually very very high. Just because we have “open source” models doesn’t mean anyone can enter. And the gap is widening now. I see Anthropic/OpenAI as clear leaders. Opus 4 and its derivative products are irreplaceable for coders since Spring 2025. Once you figure it out and have your revelation, it will be impossible to go back. This is an iPhone moment right now and the network effect will be incredible.

[mathiaspoint]

It's all text and it's all your text. There's zero network effect.

[lvl155]

And that’s how it’s been forever. If your competitor is doing 10x your work, you will be compelled to learn. If someone has a nail gun and you’re using a hammer, no one’s saying “it’s all nails.” You will go buy a nail gun.

[mathiaspoint]

Network affects come from people building on extra stuff. There's no special sauce with these models, as long as you have an inference endpoint you can recreate anything yourself with any of the models.

As to the nailgun thing, that's an interesting analogy, I'm actually building my own house right now entirely with hand tools, it's on track to finish in 1/5 the time some of this mcmansions do with 1/100th of the cost because I'm building what I actually need and not screwing around with stuff for business reasons. I think you'll find software projects are more similar to that than you'd expect.