Someone is paying. OpenAI revenue was $4.3 billion in the first half of this year.
> The artificial intelligence firm reported a net loss of US$13.5 billion during the same period
If you sell gold at $10 a gram you'll also make billions in revenues.
Like Dario/Anthropic said, every model is highly profitable on it's own, but the company keeps losing money because they always train the next model (which will be highly profitable on it's own).
"Other significant costs included $2 billion spent on sales and marketing, nearly doubling what OpenAI spent on sales and marketing in all of 2024. Though not a cash expense, OpenAI also spent nearly $2.5 billion on stock-based equity compensation in the first six months of 2025"
("spent" because the equity is not cash-based)