If openness is how you win the world's developers, does the vault still make sense?

Question

Plot twist: America's best models are mostly locked in vaults. China's best models are free downloads — and they're now the most-downloaded AI models on Earth, running in startups from Jakarta to São Paulo.

Accepted Answer

The best open models now trail the frontier by only ~3–4 months, and Chinese models account for nearly half of top open-model downloads. The vault buys a shorter head start every year — and the CEO of the most famous vault admitted in 2025 they'd been 'on the wrong side of history' and shipped an open model. (40% of Americans answer "Vault anyway" — floor est.)