With how good local models are getting this might not even be necessary. Code Llama derivatives aren't quite there yet for me but if the $20/month meant much to me they would be.

I'm not so sure using local models is a cheaper alternative. Computation/electricity is not free and OpenAI is heavily subsidised. It feels like people think local models are free just because they don't need to pay a third party directly.

I think the real benefit of local models lies elsewhere.

A lot of people here have no income and are trying to get into software (or working on their pre-revenue startups).

Especially the people who need a better Stack Overflow, are likely not to have huge employee salaries.

Students... :/

> Pay for your tools? This is not exactly a community of low-income people here.

The prices of such tools are often oriented towards people who have high-paying job in Silicon Valley. Not everybody who reads or posts on Hacker News belongs to this group. :-(