alt Hacker NewsI think you're ignoring that most users of AI currently aren't paying anything, nor would they. I believe the value of a Facebook user was $70 per year in 2023, for the US and Canada. Assuming that the AI companies could make twice that from ads, that's still only $10 - $12 per month, and even less in the rest of the world. Obviously there's going to be some business users as well, so they can cover some of the cost, but would also be responsible for a larger portion of the running cost.
The question should be how many free users can the AI companies convert.
The cost of an Uber has also gone way up, and they basically have a monopoly in many areas.
The cost of free users is much lower because they are served lite models, hit quota limits quickly, and can't soak up tokens by using agents. The main capacity usage is from agent loops, which is universally behind a paid tier.