Oh no, they might stop doing the thing that benefits me and that they were never required to do in the first place.

It can be predatory pricing that will bite us later.

How exactly will downloaded gguf files bite me later?

Is it going to shut the laptop's lid when i'm not looking and pinch my fingers?

If the only thing that bothers you is laptop lid pinching your fingers, then no – it won't do it.

It really can't be when the models are open weights and there's zero lock-in for inference providers.

Open weight is not open source. See: freeware vs free software.

Ok, so?

You have the lock-in, as you can't modify the freeware. You will be stuck will all its anti-features. Also, have a look at the reasons for having the four freedoms of free software: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-even-more-impor...

What does the ability to modify a model have to do with lock-in?

Models aren’t software. Software has a learning curve and costs of adoption. Models and inference are completely fungible.

> What does the ability to modify a model have to do with lock-in?

For example, Chinese models can spread the CCP propaganda and censor the results. You can't change it and may not even notice.

> Models aren’t software.

Models are software. They run on computers, require development, can have bugs etc. They can be downloaded or provided as SaaS.

> Models and inference are completely fungible.

Until the next version of DeepSeek becomes closed and you will only have the access to the last good open-weight model.

Sorry, are you actually paying any attention to the discussion? You’re spouting a bunch of buzzword non sequiturs. You started off by talking about how open weights aren’t open source when nobody said anything about open source. Now you’re talking about propaganda in response to a question about lock-in.

Lock-in means you can’t switch to a different model or a different provider because the cost (in time or money) of switching is high. Censorship and propaganda have nothing to do with it. You can switch to DeepSeek in an instant. You can switch away from it in an instant. The switching cost is zero.

And no, models are data files. The inference engines are software. Models run on many engines and most engines support many models. Another example of how there’s no lock-in: you can switch both models and engines at no cost. If you’re using an inference provider, they probably offer many models you can switch between, and you can switch to a different provider with no effort.

If the next version of DeepSeek becomes closed then you can switch to GLM or Kimi or MiniMax or whatever else in two seconds, or keep on using the last open version of DeepSeek. Zero lock-in.

As opposed to what? The US? You think the US is any different? Literally our pedo president publicly admits to insider trading. You think the US government gives a rat's ass about the American people?

Saying the Chinese and US governments are the same is so absurd it doesn't warrant a reply.

For someone (as me) in Mexico, they are exactly the same.

Third world societies are not "brainwashed" one way or another with respect to that.

We just see those governments throwing shade at each other. And bullying us ina similar way.

They are not what they are to you, they are not just whatever you care about, they are what they actually are.

Do you see the self-centeredness of your comment? Why is his (Mexican) perspective wrong? Just because you say it is?

Do you not see you're projecting? If I say two different types of bird are "the same to me" because they both shit on my head, that doesn't make them the same birds, that just means I only care about what they are to me, i.e. the self-centeredness you accuse me of.

You said "for me they are the same". Not in reply to someone saying "to me they're different", but to someone saying they're very different in nature, which they are. That's not a perspective, that's changing the subject and making it about you.

Do you even understand what you wrote? Because it's practically incoherent.

> They are not what they are to you, they are not just whatever you care about, they are what they actually are.

You wrote that. It's a useless comment, adds nothing to the discussion and reads like you are trying to be clever and failing at it. Learn to articulate.

>You said "for me they are the same". Not in reply to someone saying "to me they're different"

You are arguing with another user; it was I who said it.

They have some differences, yet they are the same in a lot of ways. Some people cannot see it because they have been educated a certain way. Lots of people in China really believe they are right and the US is wrong. Same in Korea, Same in Rusia. Similary, a lot of people in the US are educated to believe the US is "the best country in the world", "the good guys", "always right"; they are not.

Ah, sorry for getting you two mixed up.

I can agree to to it with the qualifier "in a lot of ways", just not without. We learn about a lot of US crimes by the reporting of US citizens and journalists, a lot of which is available to buy and re-print within the US. Meanwhile, people in China still cannot simply remember Tiananmen, much less publish books about it.

Then why did you respond with a useless self aggrandising comment?

Love the arguments btw. Your position is so cut and dry that you can’t even support it with evidence.

It's true, at least the Chinese government is competent in their authoritarianism.

The independent media reports on this and that’s why you know.

China has zero independent media and has the largest and most sophisticated censorship and surveillance state in the world.

Trump would love to have the absolute power that Xi has, but thankfully doesn’t.

Tired of this lazy whataboutism.

Whataboutism is the rallying cry of every sophist who can dish it but not take it. Whataboutismism

My comment doesn't even fall into the category of whataboutism....

No, actually trump bragged about it on x.

Trump kicked and banned major news orgs from the White House just now. You’d have to be will fully ignorant or really naive to believe we have fair and just media.

Btw how much media coverage have you seen in America related to the genocide of Gaza ? Jewish terrorism in West Bank?

That’s what I thought. There is a reason independent journalists on YT are having great success right now because legacy media is trash, bought and paid for.

Why do you think journalists are creating shows like “Mehdi Hasan unfiltered”?

You can’t in goodwill with a straight face say American media is just. Western media overall is bought and paid for.

>Btw how much media coverage have you seen in America related to the genocide of Gaza ? Jewish terrorism in West Bank?

>That’s what I thought.

Wow, you got me with your nonsequitur strawman argument that you answered yourself and isn't even true. It's easy to identify sophists with how quickly the bring up Israel out of nowhere.

The US has a structure that makes it possible to change the government, China has president for life and one party rule.

You say that as our pedo president is testing waters by doing another term and his republican lackeys are supporting him on this.

Also at the end of the day what matters is whether the government serves the people and the peoples quality of life.

Quality of life for the Chinese people has steadily increased. Quality of life for the American people has steadily decreased.

There's no "pulling back" things that have already been open sourced.

Unfortunately most of the Chinese models are open weights and not open sourced.

I agree it would be very cool if they were open sourced, but the article is talking about the KV cache technique which if I understand correctly is open source (or at least the white paper is published).

Intelligence wants to be free

Every workplace is an authoritarian regime where workers don't have a say and grovel with "please don't replace me" like that isn't the entire point.

The whole point of AI is to get rid of you so rich people can play with the planet like it's minecraft. Software engineers just think they're special because they're the ones building it like they'll get a pat on the head for being good little servants to the investor class. Or worse, that their portfolios will let them be the gods who rule over ashes.

Yes, we already discussed the US.

It's crazy how articles like this get spawn-camped by people like this trying to throw this zinger in. Both AI conpanies in the US and the chinese companies with ccp desks in the corner can be bad. The good path forward is locally hosted AI models, that's known.

Right, which is why I'm happy to see China continue to innovate in the open, and increasingly wary of the US stance given articles like

https://www.anthropic.com/research/glm-5-3-and-the-spread-of...

It's VERY clear that the US companies are trying to push for regulation to kill open models and open weights. I see this as much more hostile and authoritarian response than what we're seeing come out of China right now.

So is China going to always publish in the open? No clue. But right now they're modeling much better behavior.

What's on my drives stays on my drives.

It is in the interest of everybody-except-OpenAI and Anthropic that those companies have capable competitors; better still for the competitors to share their advances.

They don't have to be our friends to act in our interest.

Agreed, the US is not your friend and will pull the rug from under you at the first convenient opportunity.

Just like how Anthropic and OpenAI is already doing?

China is much more authoritarian than the US, but at this point it's like comparing two types of metastatic cancer.

The point is get what you can from both to develop open models, data and tools.

You can be grateful to individual things an enemy does.

Ironically the US is the only country that has done that

While your friend is Sam Altman, or US megacorps ?

Or did they not pull back when their models allegedly became highly capable, with the whole mythos debacle ?

> An authoritarian regime is not your friend

Absolutely. In fact, the authoritarian regime already did try to force export controls on major frontier labs not long go so this isn't a theoretical.

This is equally true for US AI

Chill, Buddy. Why are you so anti-American?

Their models are already highly capable. They have enough leverage to act like scumbags, yet unlike Americans, they lack the compulsion for it. That authoritarian regime you fearmonger about has in fact done an excepetional job for its people over the last half century.

At least their non friendly AIs aren't bombing schools.

At that point the US will complete its China conversion and turn on the GFW so you can't access Chinese AI services.