As far as I'm aware OpenAI doesn't control any defaults for which AIChat service to use.
The best free alternative to Google right is ironically $preferred_llm_provider and ChatGPT is the obvious uncapped free option. I think free will end up being OpenAI's most if they manage to make it profitable.
if people are still using it, then it's really one of the few things, right?
* you are wrong and it's not awful
* it _is_ awful but good enough for normal people to never care about alternatives, which are anyway not even very easy to find given the absolute stranglehold google has on that slice
either way not quite the same as choice of llms today.
Also, Google benefited from being the default on mainstream OSes. When people have to download an application, getting one or the other does not take more effort. Yes, OpenAI being tightly integrated within Windows, Android, and iOS would be a moat. That’s not the case and it is unlikely to happen. Google will go with their own and Apple won’t put itself in a situation where they are reliant on a single company, they got burned enough times.
Also which search engine was the default was a massive factor - that's why Google paid for that.
If Google hadn't controlled Chrome, and or paid for defaults - they could have pretty much lost all their traffic overnight - ( if they weren't better ).
All OpenAI has to do is not fall behind too much to the point where an alternative can generate enough hype to take the crown (see AltaVista and Google)
