This whole thread is about whether the most valuable startup of all time will be able to raise enough money to see the next calendar year.

It's definitely rational to decide to pay wholesale for LLMs given:

- consumer adoption is unclear. The "killer app" for OS integration has yet to ship by any vendor.

- owning SOTA foundation models can put you into a situation where you need to spend $100B with no clear return. This money gets spent up front regardless of how much value consumers derive from the product, or if they even use it at all. This is a lot of money!

- as apple has "missed" the last couple of years of the AI craze, there has been no meaningful ill effects to their business. Beyond the tech press, nobody cares yet.