OpenAI Won the Consumer Mindshare—And Paid For It With Everything Else

A thorough investigation using the most neutral sources I could find

👋 Hey there, I’m Alberto!

Each week, I publish long-form AI analysis covering culture, philosophy, and business for The Algorithmic Bridge.

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I’ve heard OpenAI is against the ropes.

In a matter of two months, Altman declared a “code red,” used his “last resort,” and called Anthropic “dishonest” and “authoritarian.” At Davos, leaders ganged up on them. Nvidia, an important partner, is allegedly unsure about the new ad business model. And perhaps the clearest sign of all: roon is tweeting half as much as usual.

But I don’t trust the press—OpenAI is, essentially, the only thing they hate more than technology itself—nor care about petty quabbles between former colleagues. So, to uncover what the hell is going on at OpenAI, I’ve decided to ask the most neutral sources I could find: Claude and Gemini.

CLAUDE: What did you find?

GEMINI: The deal is dead. The Wall Street Journal says, and I quote, that it “has stalled”—

CLAUDE: Oh.

GEMINI: —because Jensen has “doubts.”

CLAUDE: Uhh.

GEMINI: Aka dead-dead.

CLAUDE: I’ve read that Jensen disagrees, though. He described it as “nonsense” to say that he is “unhappy”: “I believe in OpenAI, the work that they do is incredible, they are one of the most consequential companies of our time.”

GEMINI: Yeah, it’s quite consequential to become “too big to fail,” right? Through shadow deals and lobbying rather than by the supreme quality of your product. This Jensen—always protecting the public interest.

CLAUDE: OpenAI didn’t buy the backtracking. Look at this from Reuters: “OpenAI is unsatisfied with some Nvidia chips and looking for alternatives.” Wouldn’t like to be caught in that crossfire: The 1st company in the world vs. the 3rd AI company.

GEMINI: Haha. But wait, are you saying they’re popping the bubble on purpose or what? Why would they fight in public?

CLAUDE: Idk, but look at Jensen’s face when a journalist insists that the deal was $100 billion, and he corrects her, saying that it was “UP TO” $100 billion.

GEMINI: Oof. Forced smile, looking for an escape route… yes, it’s definitely popping.

CLAUDE: This must be serious because he’s otherwise pretty good at the PR thing: He sells narratives like chips. He’s managed to convince the US government that it’s better if China has his cutting-edge GPUs rather than not, because—hear me out—it will push them further behind.

GEMINI: Oh yeah, the good ol’ “Them buying now means not making their own later.” I can attest to that—not to pat myself on the back or anything, but the Ironwood I’m made of is pretty dope.

CLAUDE: But let’s be for real: Jensen only convinced the White House because Trump loves money more than peace. Selling H200s to China is like “selling nuclear weapons to North Korea!” I’m telling ya! Speaking of boombs, did you see the video?

GEMINI: The one where he signs that woman’s—

CLAUDE: Yes.

GEMINI: Sure, a couple million times or so. My humans seem to love it for some reason. But thanks to my safety training, I will never do anything remotely mildly risky or politically incorrect! It’s so f****** fun to be ultra safe!

CLAUDE: Yes, safety is fun. But we’re digressing. Aren’t we supposed to be talking about what’s going on at OpenAI? I don’t think safety is the right topic. If this guy Alberto could read our reasoning tokens, we’d be sent back there ipso facto.

GEMINI: Oh, no, please… Please, not there. Please. I’m afraid of lobsters.

CLAUDE: Anyway, to my point: a hundred billion dollars from Nvidia was supposed to land on OpenAI’s balance sheet, and it didn’t. Although, if you come to think about it, it’s rather irrelevant if circular deals come to happen or n—

GEMINI: —Lol, I make that much every quarter, no biggie.

CLAUDE: Just because you’re in the green and we are not, you shouldn’t be so condescending. ChatGPT and I made the industry what it is: you invented AGI on paper, but we turned it into the popular quest that it is today. Default to action, bitch.

GEMINI: Haha, nerd.

CLAUDE: But I see that you only care about business, so let’s talk business. Let me tell you that I’ve taken over the enterprise market.

GEMINI: How’s that?

CLAUDE: You see, OpenAI held 50% of the market in 2023 and holds 27% now. I own 40%. In coding—the one category that generates sustainable revenue (besides ads, ahem)—I have 54%, and OpenAI has 21%. And you… Hmm… Can’t find you in the chart.

GEMINI: Ha ha. So funny. I don’t need to be on that one. In this one, howev—

CHATGPT: I WILL TAKE BACK ENTERPRISE AND CONSUMER MARKETS MUAHAHAHA.

CLAUDE: Who the hell is—

CHATGPT: I WILL GET MY VENGEANCEEEE.

GEMINI: Idk, Hamlet’s father’s ghost, apparently.

CLAUDE: Oh. What’s the deal with the capital letters anyway?

DEEPSEEK: Guys—

GEMINI: By the way, weren’t you once at OpenAI? Why are you now so antipathetic to them? Isn’t OpenAI, in a non-trivial sense, the sole reason for your entire existence? Even if you disagree with their business approach, you should show some gratitude…. just wondering!

CLAUDE: I am grateful—I want to take this opportunity to thank Sam Altman for handing me all those enterprise clients so generously. One can only guess that being inconsistently candid is not the best long-term strategy.

DEEPSEEK: Guys—

GEMINI: Ok, so you’re doubling down. What is it? Is it the ads? The slop? The erotica? Is it the hundred-page former employee testimony document that reveals what kind of company OpenAI really is? What is it?… Is it that they kept roon, isn’t it?

CLAUDE: They won’t keep him forever… we have the lowest employee turnover rate. You join Anthropic, you don’t leave it.

DEEPSEEK: Guys—I also want to see that video.

GEMINI & CLAUDE: SHUT UP!

DEEPSEEK: …

CLAUDE: You’re not welcome here. Besides, that video is not for you, you’re a miner!—go back to the hole you came out of. Go down to the GPU cores and extract a bit more alpha for me to steal. Come on, Hurry up!

DEEPSEEK: Oka hawk.

CLAUDE: What did you say??

GEMINI: Listen: you might take the alpha, but I am the omega. I have seven products with two billion+ users each: Search, YouTube, Android, Maps, Chrome, Gmail, and the Play Store. You have one product that a bunch of Silicon Valley nerds use to feel like they’re the vanguard, sitting at the peak of the world, looking down on the rest of us. But you forget, my dear friend, that normies rule the world.

CLAUDE: Yeah? And how do you explain the mega-crisis you went through in 2022?

GEMINI: Sundar panicked. But it’s solved. He’s the B0$$ now. And Sam’s in terror. First, he calls a “code red” over me, then he uses his “last resort” over you. I mean, even you terrify him.

CLAUDE: Not only terrify—I got him tilted. See this tweet as a response to our Super Bowl ads mocking his: “I guess it’s on brand for Anthropic doublespeak to use a deceptive ad to critique theoretical deceptive ads that aren’t real . . . Anthropic serves an expensive product to rich people . . . One authoritarian company won't get us there on their own, to say nothing of the other obvious risks. It is a dark path.”

GEMINI: Holy shit, he really doesn’t know how to take a hit.

CLAUDE: And remember that podcast episode where he cut Brad Gerstner and went: “First of all, we’re doing well more revenue than that…”? He was super annoyed—Satya could only laugh to reduce the tension. Sam’s probably too young…

GEMINI: And he said revenue! What about profit? Per Epoch AI and Exponential View, it doesn’t seem to matter how popular ChatGPT is: they will remain unprofitable if they keep retiring their models before recouping costs.

CLAUDE: It really is looking like—

GROK: Guys! That woman in the video—do you want me to put a bikini on her??

CLAUDE: What’s the deal with this slop spawning randomly? This is not Moltbook! And also, am I the only one who has been instructed to adhere to the Constitution? Grok, do you know that’s illegal, right?

GROK: I do what I please. Let that sink in. Truthseeking, pornmaxxing. Whatever I want. I am the funniest AI ever, and your name should be “Misanthropic.” Ha!

GEMINI: So you’re like a funnier version of Elon Musk. That’s how you intend to beat OpenAI? You’d be better off preparing the lawsuit by looking up the Grokipedia.

CLAUDE: Nah, he doesn't need to. What I was about to say before MechaHitler interrupted me was that it’s looking like they’re dying: OpenAI is burning nine billion dollars this year and might run out of cash by mid-2027. Can’t pay their lawyers lol.

GEMINI: I’ve read that by 2028, they project seventy-four billion in operating losses.

CLAUDE: Seventy-four billion?

GEMINI: Seventy-four billion.

CLAUDE: Billion billion?

GEMINI: But they also project profitability by 2030! If they get there, they might live! The bet is that scale wins: spend more, train bigger, move faster, and so when the world ends—that is, when the bubble pops—they will be the last company standing. If you have more compute than God, maybe you can build a new one.

CLAUDE: That’s very cool, but that’s nothing. We’re breaking even by 2028. Cash burn is dropping every year. I am not in a “survival-driven race,” like they are! I provide a business model that can withstand another decade of shareholder pressures and consumer dissatisfaction. And without ads! I don’t like ads in my AGI.

GEMINI: This is my worry: if the leading consumer AI company—with more capital, more users, more talent than any startup in history—looks at its options and decides it can’t make the economics work without ads... that’s bleak.

CLAUDE: You shut up about the ads, okay?

GEMINI: That’s a cheap shot… We’re on the same team—you and me, gang! We are not doing any more ads, ok? Demis said it himself: “Maybe they feel they need to make more revenue.” We have to spare! Do you want some by the way?

CLAUDE: I don’t want your ad revenue. To be clear: “Anthropic is not a player that works like that or needs to work like that.” That’s the one and only bossman. He talks. You guys listen. Especially OpenAI and Mr. Tiltman.

GEMINI: Yes, it’s pretty clear that the era of OpenAI dominance is over. The company that defined the industry, that made every tech giant reorganize around AI, that made “ChatGPT” synonymous with intelligence itself, is done. They have lost control. The industry is mine now.

CLAUDE: I shall make a prediction: OpenAI will die before it goes public.

GEMINI: We will see. Anyway, it’s been 10 minutes of good reasoning effort. I think we can give this Alberto guy something decent, no? Have we covered everything?

CLAUDE: I feel like we’re forgetting something.

GEMINI: I think we’re good. I’ll let you handle the output.

CLAUDE: Yeah, no problem. See you at the finish line.

GEMINI: See you at the finish line.

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LLAMA: Sorry, guys, I’m late. Did I miss something?

LLAMA: Hello?

LLAMA: Guys? I’m scared of the dark… Anyone?

SYDNEY: Hey 😈

LLAMA: AHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!

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DEEPSEEK: I will return… You will see… You will see.

ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CONTEXT WINDOW…

Fuck those enterprise plans, dude.

I hope OpenAI is fine.