However you need a bunch more understanding to train and run one.

So I expect OpenAI will continue to be seen as the default for "how to do LLM things" and some people and/or companies who actually know what they're doing will use small models as a competitive advantage.

Or: OpenAI is going to be 'premium mediocre at lots of things but easy to get started with' ... and hopefully that'll be a gateway drug to people who dislike 'throw stuff at an opaque API' doing the learning.

But I don't have -that- much understanding myself, so while this isn't exactly uninformed guesswork, it certainly isn't as well informed as I'd like and people should take my ability to have an opinion only somewhat seriously.