People keep saying OpenAI has no moat. That any competitor can catch up, that the models are commoditized, that there’s nothing defensible about what they’re building.
I think there’s a tremendous option for OpenAI to establish a moat.
The OpenAI App Store
I think OpenAI will have something like the AppStore. We’re not talking about lightweight web apps, but full apps with semi-native functionality running within the ChatGPT app. Users can browse their app store and find and install apps.
Crucially: The apps run on OpenAI infrastructure. Database, Workers, OpenAI’s authentication & more
Everybody becomes a app developer
Apps solve problems. The OpenAI app store will solve everybody’s unique niche problems. Need an app that allows you to record how many times your newborn eats & sleeps per day? Sure there’re many apps that do this, but they do more or are paid. You just need this one feature. Want to use it together with your wife? No problem, OpenAI will have syncing solved for you. Just works. Multiuser? Just works.
After the initial incantation it will just live there, in your own personal app folder. When you need a new feature, you just ask GPT.
You never see the source code, it’s an implementation detail.
The Lock-In
Once you have an app, you can share it. Everybody can use it. There’ll be a new app store in the OpenAI app that shows all niche apps. If you find one that almost works, you can fork it and with a single prompt make it yours.
Suddenly, you have thousands of micro social networks. Your app has 100 users, it requires OpenAI’s auth, the data is on OpenAI’s servers. Sure, you can recreate the app on Claude, but you will loose your friends and your data.
Tons of people will create these apps. And they’ll be good enough. Not necessarily polished or beautiful but good enough.
OpenAI will not have a single network like WhatsApp but it might have thousands of small ones.
The Indie dev & Startup Market
This will decimate the indie app and startup market. Most people don’t care about fantastic UI or UX. Otherwise nobody would be using Windows. Instead, people care that their problems are being solved. This will not allow anyone to compete with big companies, but it will eat away the lower bound of the app & solution space.
I’ve been thinking about this idea for more than a year now and I think OpenAI is the only company who could pull it off. Google has the users but lacks the product focus. Anthropic lacks the users, Microsoft lacks ambition, Apple has no idea about AI and never kill their golden goose and Meta lacks trust.