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Comment by rhacker | Hacker News Reader

Guess there really is a moat.

Just to nitpick that a bit, they have a lead. To me, a moat is some other axis of advantage that makes it hard for a rival to compete directly.

So for example Tesla has/had a lead in EV tech, but their supercharger network is a moat because it’s very difficult for a rival to compete with, even if they have equivalent EV tech.

I know there isn’t established terminology for this. It is a nitpick, but I think a lead is already a term we have, and moat has connotations of being in some way ‘unfair’. To me, just creating a better product isn’t unfair in any meaningful way, while moats in some circumstances can represent anti trust issues.

So like, would that not suggest that Google has a moat with AI, as it is already intertwined with our email, calendars, etc... (if they ever make their AI public)

It makes it all the more interesting that Google is currently losing to an upstart. They have a MASSIVE advantage in data and moats, but cannot execute on novel products to take advantage of it, despite also hiring a significant chunk of the talent in the market as well.

But perhaps at this stage Google's not meant to / need to build cutting edge products, but rather focus on commoditizing the ones that prove profitable.

> t makes it all the more interesting that Google is currently losing to an upstart

How is Google "losing" when they are not even in the same market? Are you expecting Google to develop and sell access to an LLM API or use AI internally to enhance it's other products (which it jas been doing to great effect)

or maybe they like their chinese wall between their internal AI and the public at large!!!

Yes, no one can build a car from scratch in their garage, but there are plenty of companies with enough capital to build their own cars and sell them to people.

OpenAI has a lead on Bard, LLaMA and friends, but I would expect that to close in the next few months or years.

It's not that the isn't a moat, but rather that it isn't looking particularly durable

Compute moat. aka cash moat. It's a deep one, too.

Company moats can grow and later shrink.

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