I agree with using smaller models, it's just that the majority of people I know feel like they need the biggest, beefier, behemoth model possible (with the longest thought setting) and consume much more than necessary when a flash or smaller model would be OK. I would also like to be able to use a smaller model, but given ram prices I would have to sell a kidney to buy ram now

Most people who use a free or $20 a month plan are already using smaller models, and the mainstream chatbot services will route requests to a smaller model often without really telling the end user.

You can run Qwen-3.6 on a 32GB card which will set you back about $1400, or $400 of just RAM if you want to run it on a CPU.