"My gloss is that GPT-5 had become something of an albatross around OpenAI’s neck. And this particular juncture, not long after inking big deals with Softbank et al. and riding as high on its cultural and political trajectory as it’s likely to get—and perhaps seeing declining rates of progress on model improvement in the labs—a calculated decision was made to pull the trigger on releasing the long-awaited model. People were going to be disappointed no matter what; let them be disappointed now, while the wind is still at OpenAI’s back, and it can credibly make a claim to providing hyper-advanced worker automation.
I don’t think the GPT-5 flop ultimately matters all that much to most folks, and it can certainly be papered over well enough by a skilled salesman in an enterprise pitch meeting. Again, all this is clarifying: OpenAI is again centering workplace automation, while retreating from messianic AGI talk."
https://www.bloodinthemachine.com/p/gpt-5-is-a-joke-will-it-matter
