alt.hn

3/30/2026 at 2:43:17 AM

The sudden fall of Sora

 https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/the-sudden-fall-of-openais-most-hyped-product-since-chatgpt-64c730c9

by fortran77

3/30/2026 at 7:00:12 PM

I went to the Snowflake Summit last year. And Altman sat on the stage saying LLMs would be coming up with new chip architectures and medical solutions within a year, and that AGI was around the corner. I turned on GPT and let it listen and respond to some of what he said. It replied, in less flattering terms than I am about to use, that he was -- being too optimistic. When you are bouncing around between AGI, Mickey Mouse videos, ad algorithms, and p@rn-bots, I think it's appropriate to question your motives.

by relation_al

3/31/2026 at 2:49:29 AM

I think the only logical conclusion is that many of these tech leaders are liars or have absolutely no idea what they are talking about. Maybe somewhere in between.

On here and else where there are people who see AI for what it is and are absolutely blown away by it and defend these people without realizing that they are regularly promising something much more to investors that can never be fulfilled. The idea that LLMs can ever reach any sense of true AGI is delusional.

by etempleton

3/30/2026 at 4:27:24 AM

It makes total sense to me that this would happen. The economics around Sora and video generation in general are just not there right now, and if you're a company that's also doing research into these things, that's basically a bottomless pit for money. I think OpenAI ceding the space to Google and others for the moment is probably the smart move.

I had fun using Sora and I'm bummed to see it will get removed from the API as well later this year, but no biggie. Veo is plenty good.

It really must cost so much money to generate these videos. That they can generate 12 second videos that are high quality in such a short amount of time - that takes some serious horsepower.

by _doctor_love

3/30/2026 at 4:50:37 AM

If anything, Sora was an experimental question: giving away video generation is expensive, but is the voluntary user labeling and engagement data, which can be fed into RLHF, accretive enough to model training that it's a meaningful trade to make?

The shutdown of the service makes it clear that the answer was "no."

(It's not a particularly useful signal, though, in evaluating OpenAI's future. It could mean that OpenAI is less interested in video data, which might have implications on their AGI ambitions. It could equally mean that OpenAI has enough data that it's hit diminishing returns, or has found a cheaper source of labeling, or doesn't consider it meaningful one way or another. So there's a lot of thoughtpieces that the shutdown is a sign of weakness, but I don't think it's worth jumping to conclusions.)

by btown

3/30/2026 at 7:29:44 PM

I thought the expectation was cleaning up the balance sheet in preparation for IPO.... along with a pivot towards codegen revenue.

by htrp

3/30/2026 at 5:31:54 PM

OpenAI is undergoing a significant strategic pivot toward developing world models.

by adfm

3/30/2026 at 6:57:03 PM

I'm actually very surprised, even if it was costing money. Their technological moat has turned out to be much more shallow than expected and competition fiercer. At the moment I think their greatest asset is brand and engagement. With a popular product and a deal with Disney seemed like a slam dunk on remaining prominent in the brand space and retaining user engagement.

Not only have they thrown out a name everyone knew, and exited the market segment, but they've also triggered Netflix/Google graveyard woes. "We may not maintain products you like". This could make people wary of buying into new products, "will it be there in a year?"

by ticulatedspline

3/30/2026 at 3:50:09 AM

Was ChatGPT hyped?

It took off rapidly but that was hardly because of any hyping and almost entirely due to word of mouth and people actually liking the product, until the press picked up on it.

From what I remember they still had an invite process when they were getting popular and the demand clearly overwhelmed their servers several times, indicating a much bigger response than they expected. If anything I think OpenAI was downplaying the product at the time.

by adjejmxbdjdn

3/30/2026 at 6:17:54 AM

OpenAI were completely taken by surprise by the success of ChatGPT. Internally there were debates over whether they should launch it at all.

It's had a ton of hype since then of course.

by simonw

3/30/2026 at 5:21:57 AM

ChatGPT is one of the most hyped tech products ever. We’ve had nearly 4 years of hype. From claims of AGI to claims we need UBI because of the ways it will devastate the work force.

by drawfloat

3/30/2026 at 4:55:33 PM

What are you talking about? It has nearly a billion users. It's the fastest growing consumer app in history. What about it is hype? What does hype even mean?

You might not like the discussion around the tech, but to say the tech is hyped like something like NFTs where they had a crazy amount of media coverage and a tiny minority of people actually using it, is just wrong.

by bko

3/30/2026 at 8:43:10 PM

Candy Crush was downloaded over a billion times within 3 years of its release. Whether or not users kept playing it after the first few levels is unknown. I imagine it's roughly similar for OpenAI; lots of curiosity-driven signups from the hoi polloi, but retention likely drops off once familiar properties like Google and Meta start embedding AI summaries in their own highly-visited tools.

by rchaud

3/30/2026 at 7:30:08 PM

AGI is around the corner, nobody will code by the end of 2026, and the devastation is likely to be so vast we need to start looking at UBI now to stem the tide of job losses. Movie studios should also start worrying because Sora will soon generate all the movies people need tailored to exactly what they want.

Yes, absolutely zero hype.

by drawfloat

3/30/2026 at 6:26:33 PM

Did you read OPs part about AGI and UBI hype?

by wil421

3/31/2026 at 2:53:47 AM

I think the way Sam Altman talked about AI. The framing of it. That they had to hold back the real version because it is just too powerful; they don't even know how it is working; it is already doing these incredible things that would change the world, but we can't / won't release it was all cleverly orchestrated.

by etempleton

3/30/2026 at 4:39:44 AM

> It took off rapidly but that was hardly because of any hyping and almost entirely due to word of mouth and people actually liking the product, until the press picked up on it.

Not my experience. A whole lot of breathless mentions in media, LinkedIn, and especially top-down company emails. Far fewer cases of people actually liking/using it.

by lmm

3/30/2026 at 3:51:14 AM

Yes, that is what hype is. It was organic hype, and is frankly the only real way to do it otherwise you get backlash.

by ares623

3/30/2026 at 4:05:09 AM

Those products aren’t typically described as having been “hyped” though — just successful or viral. Hyped has a sort of derogatory/schadenfreude subtext.

by svnt

3/30/2026 at 4:17:40 AM

I thought "hype" was a different thing from "organic growth" but similar

by HeWhoLurksLate

3/31/2026 at 3:10:52 PM

I heard on the Daily AI brief they are shutting it down in order to make server space.

by theaicloser

3/30/2026 at 3:18:49 AM

The hype cycle for AI products is brutal. Going from "this will change everything" to silence in a few months is rough. Makes you wonder how many other AI products are riding the same wave right now without anyone noticing.

by wontopos

3/30/2026 at 7:45:14 AM

We will notice once they fall silent too.

by classified

3/30/2026 at 3:27:21 AM

The whole company appears to be a giant pile of burning cash at this point and I can only imagine that this wasn’t exactly helping that situation.

Was it fun while it lasted? Sorta, but it got old pretty quick.

Is this a business? Hell no.

by cmiles8

3/30/2026 at 3:41:07 AM

Just wait until Sir Jony Ive's unapologetically AI hardware products that cost too much, do too little, and also flop.

by anonym00se1

3/30/2026 at 11:46:52 AM

Their video about “one day we’ll do something cool, totally, trust us” was so weird. Just in the philosophy if hype over substance in that it puts them in the group of bullshit companies vs the just do stuff and tell you about it when it’s ready.

by prepend

3/30/2026 at 4:07:04 AM

One would have to think he’s having second thoughts. Attaching himself to a sinking ship would torpedo his legacy.

by cmiles8

3/30/2026 at 4:27:58 AM

I doubt that comes into it. Ive wants to design what he wants to design, whether people like that universally or not is clearly not a concern to him. Everyone hated the MacBook keyboards for years, the lack of ports, the iPhone not getting USB-C until a decade late, whatever the Magic Mouse is, etc. Ive is just ungrounded from what people want, 20% of the time he knows better and changes the industry, 80% of the time it just annoys people.

by danpalmer

3/30/2026 at 2:36:32 PM

He probably gets to be a billionaire if OpenAI floats which would be nice.

by tim333

3/30/2026 at 3:53:24 AM

Whatever happened to that one? I suspect they made the video and announcement for the PR and didn't actually have a plan. Then the Friend AI and Meta glasses thing came out and I suspect Sir Ive is having some serious second thoughts in putting his brand onto anything like that.

It seems no one wants a dedicated AI hardware product. Because the smartphone exists.

by ares623

3/30/2026 at 7:50:25 AM

It's a business for all the spin doctors who make money with creative marketing to keep the hype going. Everyone with the ability to sell hot air has an opportunity to get rich right now.

by zombot

3/30/2026 at 3:30:47 AM

Meanwhile, Sora and other video models have become available on Openrouter. Are we sure this is the end of Sora? Or just the interface?

by nclin_

3/30/2026 at 3:57:38 AM

They’re slowly deprecating and ending the Sora API over the next 6 months.

by throwaway314155

3/30/2026 at 3:50:39 AM

What is the fallout if OpenAI goes under?

by tbreschi

3/31/2026 at 3:00:04 AM

Investors immediately lose confidence in the entire space. Anyone who doesn't have other revenue streams -- e.g. Google, Apple, Microsoft, X -- probably goes under or sells shortly thereafter. the aforementioned big tech companies pull back investment considerably because shareholders no longer want to see investment in AI because they see it as a waste of capital resources that could be spent on things that actually make money. They go for the simplest lowest cost implementations and largely abandon advancements. Billions if not trillions of dollars in data center plans and hardware purchases are cancelled causing significant pain in the hardware sector. Hardware manufactures try to pivot to the next thing, but it will be multi year slow process to pivot.

by etempleton

3/30/2026 at 4:15:38 AM

Eventually a new era of maturity and cost discipline.

by kev009

3/30/2026 at 5:27:30 PM

Anthropic takes the lead, hopefully.

by Sohcahtoa82

3/30/2026 at 11:03:55 PM

A downside is less competition in the space.

Which may or may not be a good thing depending if you want AI to "succeed".

by HDBaseT

3/30/2026 at 4:29:16 AM

First thing that comes to mind is musk will be absolutely insufferable and childish about it. A lot of companies will be impacted but it’s not going to happen. They are cleaning up their messes to go public

by yalogin

3/30/2026 at 4:05:39 AM

A systemic risk to the financial sector due to their overexposure to CDOs? Yes, I know that's the same plot as 2008. The writers have gotten lazy.

by MengerSponge

3/30/2026 at 4:14:38 AM

Replace financial sector with big tech and overexposure to CDOs to overexposure to large promised data centers build outs and you have the right answer.

by zitterbewegung

3/30/2026 at 5:07:13 AM

I'm not an expert, but I can't see how they truly go under in the way Enron or Theranos did. If they did hit massive financial trouble the issue wouldn't be that their technology was bad, it would just be that they didn't have enough runway to get to a point where they could make the tech profitable. Someone with deep pockets would step in an buy them up before they went to 0 under the belief that they could last long enough to make the math work. Microsoft has a huge vested interest in keeping them solvent since they own so much of it already. Amazon clearly wants in after this last round of funding. I also wouldn't be surprised if Musk tried to buy it given that xAI seems like a bit of a shit show and I can't think of a better way for him to assert dominance over Altman than to take a company that Altman almost bankrupted and make it successful.

by superfrank

3/30/2026 at 3:22:55 AM

Honestly given that they’re nowhere near profitable even with their main product this is the right move.

by Insanity

3/30/2026 at 5:34:12 AM

[dead]

by 10keane

3/30/2026 at 3:04:19 AM

[flagged]

by minsung0830

3/30/2026 at 3:43:13 AM

Was it your first time doing video production? (or maybe you had done solo or larger projects before)

by Barbing

3/30/2026 at 3:49:04 AM

Well then this is great news.

by platevoltage

3/30/2026 at 4:17:02 AM

even more reason to cheer for the rest of us

by byzantinegene

3/30/2026 at 3:09:49 AM

[flagged]

by gnabgib

3/30/2026 at 3:24:44 AM

Unbelievable. Some dude makes an hn account after lurking who knows how long, makes his very first innocuous comment a day later, and is immediately attacked as a newb or a shill? Give people at least a little benefit of the doubt.

by sgc

3/30/2026 at 3:35:05 AM

"Prior to possession of a hacker news account, a man existeth not" Ancient Chinese proverb

by abcde666777

3/30/2026 at 3:41:38 AM

None of those things were said, you're reading a lot into a 1 day old account commenting on a 5 day old story.

by gnabgib

3/30/2026 at 4:57:55 AM

They're just removing it from public access and selling it to big money instead. Think large advertising companies, government agencies, Coke-Cola, Hollywood, etc. The scary part is now that they've removed it publicly, it's going to be harder to keep a pulse on what is real and what is fake. We can't trust any video, audio or text content now.

by ting0

3/30/2026 at 6:19:00 AM

That's not what's happening. Disney were due to invest $1bn in OpenAI to partner on Sora and that deal has been cancelled.

by simonw