> Most of what we're building out at this point is the inference [...] We're profitable on inference. If we didn't pay for training, we'd be a very profitable company.
IE OpenAI invests in Cursor/Windsurf/Startups that give away credits to users and make heavy use of inference API. Money flows back to OpenAI then OpenAI sends it back to those companies via credits/investment $.
It's even more circular in this case because nvidia is also funding companies that generate significant inference.
It'll be quite difficult to figure out whether it's actually profitable until the new investment dollars start to dry up.
That is an openai skeptic. His research if correct says not only is openai unprofitable but it likely never will be. Can't be ,its various finance ratios make early uber, amazon ect look downright fiscally frugal.
He is not a tech person for what that means to you.
He is not wrong about everything. For example, after Sam Altman said in January that OpenAI would introduce a model picker, Zitron was able to predict in March that OpenAI would introduce a model picker. And he was right about that.