For most of the world, open-source AI is the only way forward

pmontra

Agreed but I want to see how it plays out. Historically a good Windows computer cost $1000 and it was all it took to start programming. How much does it cost a computer with enough resources to run a good enough AI model for agentic workflows and a reasonable time to first token? Can "most of the world" afford buying one?

echelon

We don't need rinky-dink RTX models that budget VRAM. We need large scale open weights models just as capable as what's at the frontier. And we need the ability to rent compute and spin up the weights easily. One-click, easy enough for anyone. Easier than nerd tools like ComfyUI, Claw, and node graph garbage. Freedom is owning very large scale weights. Anything less is subsistence.

blakesterz

There's a video of the entire session here: https://webtv.un.org/en/asset/k14/k14ej1ucqu?kalturaStartTim... (if that link doesn't work, it starts about 12 minutes into the start)

mbgerring

There is no reason we should accept the enclosure of the digital commons represented by AI. The data these models are trained on amounts to the total intellectual and artistic output of human kind through recorded history. It belongs to all of us, and accordingly, so should the models and weights produced by it.

robwwilliams

Yann is on the mark. Almost amusing to see the EU along with its many former “subjects” realize they are at great risk of joint Chinese-American hegemony in AI. We should all be more terrified of a few nation states defining the agendas and policies of AI use than current Ai variants that a inherently without purpose or autonomy. Great analogy to the fear of the printing press being really bad news in that it enabled the rabble to get aroused.

paxys

We aren’t going to have Open Source AI without Open Source hardware specs and Open Source manufacturing. Software has been solo driving open computing for far too long, and with AI now the bottlenecks are finally moving up the stack.

dippogriff

Edge models will get much better after the current insane capex and organic data for pre-training is dried out. But hard to see how the best open source models will ever come close to the best closed ones.

peterlk

Over the long term, it seems like open models must win out. This feels like it rhymes with the story of operating systems. Despite the enormous financial contributions of Microsoft and Apple, linux still won because control matters over the long term. I predict that mech interp and things like Neuronpedia will matter more and more over time, and the frontier providers are disincentivized from providing those tools

prmoustache

What is Open-Source AI? Has it been defined? By all accounts, all AI companies starting with open are doing proprietary stuff. All models delivered for free as "open-models" are just freeware as no source is really provided.

mossTechnician

> LeCun framed AI as an infrastructure-level platform that will soon mediate "all of our interaction with the digital world with information more generally" This doesn't read as revolutionary, it reads as accepting a premise without explaining how and why it will and must be the case. Some of my favorite parts of the internet - wikis and forums and blogs - are special to me because there is no procedurally generated mediator between me and the information. I don't want a summary that was never intended by the author. I don't want the rough edges shaved off every blog until they all sound like they were written with an identical voice. Maybe some people would like that some of the time, but all ?

snootypoot

not only is he correct, but this path will result in openai going the way of enron. i hope in the case of openai and their collaborators in nvidia we see more people going to prison.