If you have to ask the question, then you already know the answer

Scaling was only a meme because OpenAI kept saying all you had to do was scale the data, scale the training. The world followed.

I don't think this is the "era of research". At least not the "era of research with venture dollars" or "era of research outside of DeepMind".

I think this is the "era of applied AI" using the models we already have. We have a lot of really great stuff (particularly image and video models) that are not yet integrated into commercial workflows.

There is so much automation we can do today given the tech we just got. We don't need to invest one more dollar in training to have plenty of work to do for the next ten years.

If the models were frozen today, there are plenty of highly profitable legacy businesses that can be swapped out with AI-based solutions and workflows that are vastly superior.

For all the hoopla that image and video websites or individual foundation models get (except Nano Banana - because that's truly magical), I'm really excited about the work Adobe of all companies is doing with AI. They're the people that actually get it. The stuff they're demonstrating on their upcoming roadmap is bonkers productive and useful.