> I want a jet airplane, but I can't afford one, and all the ones that exist are proprietary.

I guess if you worked together with some people who all put some money into a fund, and by using very modern technologies like 3D printing and modern CAD modelling etc., it should be possible even for private people to build a jet airplane.

The problem rather is that the government does an insane amount of gatekeeping to prevent this from happening (enforcing expensive and time-consuming certifications on airplanes and pilots etc.).

You're talking about an end user not being able to afford a luxury item.

The concern is about elite level researchers no longer being able to move the industry forward in a public way, and leaving potentially all major discoveries in private hands going forward.

Possible worst case scenario in your case, you personally miss out on a luxury item.

Possible worst case scenario in the topic case, an AI company controls the only intelligence that discovers and understands the most powerful tools / physics we know of.

You could theoretically run these (slowly) if they were open weight. ~$10k of DDR4 is enough to hold them. The data itself costs ~0 to replicate.