When I taught at a business school, our textbooks told us that once a company had a large lead in a field, they should ask for regulation. Regulations build walls to protect their lead by increasing the cost to compete against them.

I believe this is what OpenAI is doing, and it makes me sad as a teacher.

AI is the greatest tool for equity and social justice in history. Any poor person with Internet access can learn (almost) anything from ChatGPT (http://chat.openai.com)

A bright student trapped in a garbage school where the kid to his right is stoned and the kid to his left is looking up porn on a phone can learn from personalized AI tutors.

While some complain that AI will take our jobs, they are ignoring the effect of competition. Humans will become smarter with AI tutors. Humans will become more capable with AI assistants. With AI an individual can compete with a large corporation. It reminds me of the early days of the World Wide Web and the "Online, nobody knows you are a dog" memes.

I hope the best hope many bright and poor kids have is not taken away to protect the power bases of the rich and powerful. They deserve a chance.