What does the author mean by "win"?

Does he mean that the _best model_ should be an open source one (eg: today, something better than Fable 5), or just that open source models should be the default choice for most task?

The former seems an impossibility, closed labs can work off of open and their own closed research. Closed source will always be better. Well, at least until some late-stage enshittification dynamics cause the providers to hobble them.

The latter, becoming a default, not so much. But considering the deep-rooted nature of (for instance) Google, it certainly won't be a walk in the park. This seems to be a similar hurdle as dethroning Chrome as the default browser.

For the average ChatGPT user, I surmise that open-source models are already capable enough. Most people I know who use it (me included) are not paying for it, they are routed to the cheaper models.

What's needed here is everything else other than the model to be in place. Which is to say there isn't a sufficiently good open source ChatGPT app, every open source option requires more fiddling than the ChatGPT app.

No precedent comes to mind for non-tech-user software that is open source and also a default choice. The limitation is rarely from the core-tech capability; core-tech is often the same as what closed source uses.