> But AI grew up in universities until it transpired that sufficient capital could only be found in the private sector.

One way of looking at it. Another is that AI research progressed within universities, but it was only until recently that the private sector saw the profit potential when combined with modern CPU/GPU technology.

You could argue we're saying the same thing, but I think these angles are different. An academic research programme would not have spent billions on a datacentre to provide AI for free to the general public, for example.

I agree an academic research program wouldn’t spend billions on a datacenter, but that’s just a reason why foss AI as described in this article won’t work - because big compute is required to do anything of real relevance.