The term Crippleware is ablest and we should probably stop using it.
That said, I like the frugly approach. The cosmetic upgrade approach in Fortnite the author mentioned is also implemented in a new game I've been playing called The Finals. It is nice not to have winning behind a paywall.
There's nothing wrong with the term, it succinctly conveys the limited functionality of this software.
Words aren't sentient and as such they cannot be ableist, only people can. It's perfectly clear that the author didn't intend to offend, demean, or discriminate against any disabled person with their choice of words, they were merely writing about their own software.
I’m too much of a bitchy queen to get past the author’s writing style, so I only got through a few paragraphs.
At the end of the day, the incumbents are mostly providing the APIs or the hardware to do anything significant. There may be a handful of outliers, but it seems a vast majority of AI startups these days are a new iteration of resellers.
Before, it was hosting that was resold, now it is APIs or if their customers have any gumption TPUs and GPUs, which is arguably still hosting.
I don’t see startups ruling AI.
Also, a lot of people misattribute the label of startup to established companies. I could go on a rant about tech journalists being the cause, but I’ll just say OpenAI is not a startup.
