Most cutting edge technologies through history have been 1) somewhat opaque and 2) narrow/exclusive in their deployment. Historically speaking, that's virtually synonymous with "cutting edge technology".
Whining that I, a random Internet user with limited budget, usecases that the researchers don't care about, and no connection to the researchers, don't get technical details (??) or access (??) on day one is just profoundly goofy shit.
Obviously being able to use these things right away would be more exciting. But to be unable to get excited by advancements we can't immediately use is... quite entitled.
The sole purpose of a press release is to generate positive interest. It is not entitled for the reader to expect the time they have invested in reading it to be worthwhile.
It’s not an exciting advancement if it’s just the AI equivalent of google wave. It’s totally reasonable to be skeptical of marketing and want to try something for yourself.
> But to be unable to get excited by advancements we can't immediately use is... quite entitled.
Well, I didn't go knocking on Google's door asking them to give me access to their fancy models. It's them who came up to us saying "hey, look at the amazing model we have here; too bad we won't tell you anything about how it works nor even let you access it". Entitled you say? Then maybe don't dangle a carrot right before my face, and then complain that I would like to eat it?
It's just a lame gimmick, this is not 2024 anymore, people have started to get sick of this AI thingie, especially when it comes to video/image generation. That Simon guy with his pelican is the exception that can only be seen on tech forums like this one.
As to why US (and probably also some Chinese) companies have started pouring hundreds of billions into AI-image generation is beyond my comprehension, but on the other hand I'm no economic genius.
If I can’t realistically use it then I don’t care, especially when there’s no independent proof yet it works this well, given a cursory glance. If it trickles down into future developments I can use then cool, but it likely won’t because they want a moat. You don’t have to shield the poor defenseless multi-billion dollar megacorp from the genuine apathy they inspire.
If this is the best “frontier” they can achieve, then it’s no wonder they haven’t done anything groundbreaking in the space yet that produces practical results.
We should distill everything else we can into open weights.
These are exciting for robotics and industrial perhaps, but they have no consumer use case until the lid is blown off and consumers can do whatever they want with them.
So much societal progress is behind held up because the leading labs want to keep a stranglehold on the tech. Imagine if every PhD or hacker had access to the raw weights.
The general history of new technologies is that they're available for a narrow set of circumstances and then they proliferate. Can't believe that needs to be said on "hackernews"
Except that most technology was built in a way that didn't require all of the humanity knowledge and labor to be sequestered and then regurgitated back as slop that we need to pay as a subscription from what essentially is a rent seeking mafia.
I mean this doesn't seem very insane? Basic info about the model, the ability to actually use it. Google in particular is awful about getting access to their models from the UX side: I don't even bother trying them out unless it's via openrouter.
Yeah, I want that too, including the weights and training material. But I am still exited by what one could potentially do with it, by looking at the prompts and generated videos, even if it is cherry picked.
i think he's bummed out that a cool thing has shipped but: 1. he doesn't get any information about how it works 2. he doesn't get to use it
sure, it's still a cool accomplishment but i can understand being a little bit frustrated / not as excited for such an announcement.
Most cutting edge technologies through history have been 1) somewhat opaque and 2) narrow/exclusive in their deployment. Historically speaking, that's virtually synonymous with "cutting edge technology".
Whining that I, a random Internet user with limited budget, usecases that the researchers don't care about, and no connection to the researchers, don't get technical details (??) or access (??) on day one is just profoundly goofy shit.
Obviously being able to use these things right away would be more exciting. But to be unable to get excited by advancements we can't immediately use is... quite entitled.
Most cutting edge technologies through history did not have near-peer widely-deployed open competitors. This technology does.
The sole purpose of a press release is to generate positive interest. It is not entitled for the reader to expect the time they have invested in reading it to be worthwhile.
3 replies →
It’s not an exciting advancement if it’s just the AI equivalent of google wave. It’s totally reasonable to be skeptical of marketing and want to try something for yourself.
5 replies →
> But to be unable to get excited by advancements we can't immediately use is... quite entitled.
Well, I didn't go knocking on Google's door asking them to give me access to their fancy models. It's them who came up to us saying "hey, look at the amazing model we have here; too bad we won't tell you anything about how it works nor even let you access it". Entitled you say? Then maybe don't dangle a carrot right before my face, and then complain that I would like to eat it?
2 replies →
In order to claim there is any 'advancement' here requires a baseline of openness which is not met here.
> is just profoundly goofy shit
Why not expect it? It's what most model releases do.
Yeah, I read it as: " Cool! Who cares? " Maybe because that's how I felt
You must have a very narrow conception of sanity.
The future is coming by appointment only.
I think this might be what Gibson meant by "... it's just not evenly distributed"
Not insane at all, completely sensical.
> frontier technology
It's just a lame gimmick, this is not 2024 anymore, people have started to get sick of this AI thingie, especially when it comes to video/image generation. That Simon guy with his pelican is the exception that can only be seen on tech forums like this one.
As to why US (and probably also some Chinese) companies have started pouring hundreds of billions into AI-image generation is beyond my comprehension, but on the other hand I'm no economic genius.
No it’s not insane.
If I can’t realistically use it then I don’t care, especially when there’s no independent proof yet it works this well, given a cursory glance. If it trickles down into future developments I can use then cool, but it likely won’t because they want a moat. You don’t have to shield the poor defenseless multi-billion dollar megacorp from the genuine apathy they inspire.
If this is the best “frontier” they can achieve, then it’s no wonder they haven’t done anything groundbreaking in the space yet that produces practical results.
It's another closed world model.
Only open weights matter.
We should distill everything else we can into open weights.
These are exciting for robotics and industrial perhaps, but they have no consumer use case until the lid is blown off and consumers can do whatever they want with them.
So much societal progress is behind held up because the leading labs want to keep a stranglehold on the tech. Imagine if every PhD or hacker had access to the raw weights.
The general history of new technologies is that they're available for a narrow set of circumstances and then they proliferate. Can't believe that needs to be said on "hackernews"
Default internet culture is "I am entitled to everything digital, in full, for free".
Which stems from the fact that most people have never created or contributed anything meaningful.
1 reply →
Except that most technology was built in a way that didn't require all of the humanity knowledge and labor to be sequestered and then regurgitated back as slop that we need to pay as a subscription from what essentially is a rent seeking mafia.
The only one pretending this is something that needs to be said, for whatever reason, is you.
amen
I mean this doesn't seem very insane? Basic info about the model, the ability to actually use it. Google in particular is awful about getting access to their models from the UX side: I don't even bother trying them out unless it's via openrouter.
Yeah, I want that too, including the weights and training material. But I am still exited by what one could potentially do with it, by looking at the prompts and generated videos, even if it is cherry picked.