The Text-to-Video (T2V) market has been booming lately. While Runway was expanding into new horizons beyond Text-to-Image (T2I) with Gen-2, OpenAI unveiled Sora, heating up the T2V field even further. Although I lack much myself, I happen to have many close acquaintances in the AI industry—some even working at those very companies—and hearing stories from them left a deep impression on me and provided great lessons, so I am writing them down.
Regardless of what you are currently doing, how would you feel if a competitor or the most recognized number one in the market jumped in? It is essentially the real-life version of the question said to have circulated like a legend among VCs over a decade ago: "What will you do if Naver or Kakao does OOO?" or "What will you do if a conglomerate enters the market?" In Korea, these often become subjects of dispute over plagiarism, infringement on local mom-and-pop businesses, etc., but sorting out the right and wrong of the facts is a matter for the courts; what if you were the one targeted?
Usually—or rather, most people—show discomfort when someone copies them or tries to enter a field they have preempted. That is the typical reaction. Most fear that their share will shrink or that the value of what they discovered first will decline. Some say it is a natural step for the market to grow. None of these arguments can be deemed entirely wrong, but the perspective I heard was a very intriguing approach. The reaction was simply: "We weren't wrong!"
When working on a side project or starting something new, if an already recognized player or elite group in the market has entered, I actually think it makes it even more worth pursuing. Think about how much deliberation and effort it took for them to reach that outcome. I believe there is also real fun in finding our own charm, identifying what they cannot do but we can, and taking on the challenge.
For startups working on T2V, rather than causing despair, the capability and performance showcased by OpenAI—a massively valued universe currently ranked number one—served as an opportunity to become even more convinced that "We weren't wrong!" and turned out to be an uplifting moment. It was also impressive to hear that the sentiment was that a breakthrough had been found for unresolved problems, given the technical report published alongside Sora's unveiling mentioned the synergy of using a Diffusion model together with a Transformer, and most of the corresponding and primary authors were the developers of DALL-E 3.
While some people are reluctant to have others step into their domain and try to reject them, what if you adopted a truly smarter and more constructive mindset: instead of complaining or placing blame, thinking, "My instincts were right!"? If a major corporation, a competitor, or anyone else enters the field you are working in, take it as proof that someone else shares your insight, and perhaps indulge in a bit of self-praise: "I was doing something first that cost so much money and dedicated professional talent to enter."
Honestly, whether it is change or innovation, I believe something begins right here. It is about acceptance rather than exclusion, and considering how to digest it. Just as even the finest elixir or serendipitous fortune fails to become internal strength if not properly absorbed—and can even cause internal damage (qi deviation) if absorbed incorrectly—why not adopt the seemingly mundane yet powerful mindset of acceptance and encouragement?