Xerox is incidentally a really good example, because precisely nobody ended up using the desktop experience Xerox made. They ended up using the desktop experience that Microsoft and Apple made and shipped while Xerox the actual company faded and memory of those original parc research teams faded into obscurity.
Incentives are one thing, even adjusting for them it's huge, and I don't understand this incentive play for only openai, academics have perverse incentives too, to overreport, overclaim, publication bias etc why are we scrutinizing AI industry to such high degree when they have demonstrated capability and often times are off by a model release at worst.