>The companies are giving average lay people access to a personal PhD to help with whatever they are working on, for $20/mo, and those companies are committing an evil cardinal sin?

The social media companies gave their services for free, and now it turns out they've committed quite a few sins. None of the AI companies are doing this out of the goodness of their hearts, nor will they be satisfied with subscription revenue. If they see opportunities to make more money by manipulating the population, rest assured they will take those opportunities.