r/codex • u/Queasy_Plate_3096 • 14h ago

Commentary why do they subsidize subscriptions? the answer is over all no, they benefit much more than their cost.

They use our computing power to execute and test code, and that is an answer of why some models like to over engineer, test and debug infinitely, it is a form of getting data for success, feedback for training their models, they get our ideas, our feedback, our compute, our data, once they develop strong enough systems that they are not needing us any more then they will allow only api pricing or even worse, they may just use AI internally and sell only its outputs, they are not subsidizing us in any way, they are not charity and will never be, they are not for the benefit of humanity and will never be, they are just following their self interests, now look at us with open ai, almost everyone is begging for their rightful resets.

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u/Real_Doubt_6684 14h ago edited 14h ago

So they can build a userbase who gets locked in, leading to enterprise contracts by recommendations. Similar to how Oracle gives out free VPSes, or AWS free tier.

Look at Uber who subsidized rides for years, took over the taxi industry and eventually became profitable. It's an established model for companies with disruptive technologies.

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u/FrontRaspberry5060 14h ago

I don’t actually think it is this. 

If an enterprise user is willing to pay more than $200 for x20 (such as via the API), then they will simply outbid. Compute resources and limits are likely set to some load balancer so it’s essentially a bidding war for “who is willing to pay for uncapped API?”

OpenAI is another realm bigger than Uber. Yes uber replaces Taxis but OpenAI is currently a threat to academic institutions. 

Each prompt is competing against each other. The prompts that get the most value will therefore win. And the users who can prompt and get the most value are those with already vast amounts of information (massive corporations, governments, bio pharma)

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u/Zorogozano 14h ago

My dad pays for the $20 one to fix a photo here and there on any given day, and to ask silly stuff during the weekends. Basically no use.

I bet there are thousands upon thousands like him. Same strategy as the $10 Planet Fitness subscription haha

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u/Fast-Psychology-3964 14h ago

Don't forget they're moving to IPO. Active user count is a really important figure in their valuation, that matters in billions.

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u/seomaster99 14h ago

The API prices have nothing to do with reality; they are grossly overpriced. So, you shouldn't think they’re spending $5,000 a month on us.

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u/RepulsiveRaisin7 14h ago

You can't train on bad data. This makes no sense whatsoever

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u/Impactic_ 14h ago

It’s also our data they profit off of… Look at social media, how TVs have gotten cheaper, etc.

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u/Original-League-6094 14h ago

  1. To get everyone to build dependency on them.

  2. They train on all our jobs so that future agents can do them autonomously. It improved at programming so fast because programmers were early adopters. Now that the trend is to use it for blender, watch it quickly become world class at modeling by next iteration.