I use AI frequently. I am frequently let down. Occasionally satisfied and very rarely impressed. My results seem typical for everyone else I know. It's a free and widely promoted tool that has the potential to be useful, of course people will use it. The features I find most useful, is not providing me new knowledge. It's formalizing something I wrote or summarizing some other text, that I am going to read anyway or can at least reference as needed and confirm the output. This is also where the local models Excel.

I also often see people post AI generated advice and answers that are simply incorrect in Facebook groups and get roasted with 100s of people chiming in on how you can trust ChatGPT.

I just can't see regular people are going to pay more than (NetFlix + HBO + Prime + WM+) for an AI subscription. I think you would see tons of competitors pop up if that were at all viable.

"If you are brand new to the tech world, and this is your first new product cycle, the way it works is that there is a free-cool-we're-awesomely-generous phase, and then when you are hooked and they are entrenched, the real price comes to fruition. See...pretty much every tech start-up burning runway cash."

That has indeed been the strategy, but it's not like it always or even usually works out. We've seen plenty of companies that try to raise their prices and people aren't hooked. (Though I am almost certain in this case at least professionals if not the general public will indeed be hooked.)

If you really don't know a single such person, you live in a very odd bubble. I know lots of people who used ChatGPT a lot when it first came out, found it funny and occasionally useful, then changed their mind to just finding it funny occasionally, and then eventually stopped because it wasn't that useful and was no longer funny.

None of them ever considered getting a paid account, nor would they have. I'm not saying nobody will, but if you actually don't know any such people then there is something unusual about the crowd you run with.

> actually found that pretty much every worker was using AI almost daily

What they found is that people search the Internet for things and an AI bot is right there. What they didn't find is people using Vibe coded apps, learning from AI or buying AI services. They did find companies buying AI services, but as an experiment. Also, blaming AI is easy when someone messes up and costs a customer or sale. The more that happens, the sooner the company stops experimenting. If that happens in a widespread way, then this bubble collapses.

You sound very naive.

A good way to think about it is that ChatGPT is well on its way to becoming a verb like Google did. Doesn't roll off the tongue as easily but in terms of brand awareness it feels ubiquitous.