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OpenAI builds an LLM and an api-interface to that model. The design of abstractions, prompt engineering, custom fine-tunes and software engineering required to
by inductive_magic 3y ago
OpenAI builds an LLM and an api-interface to that model.
The design of abstractions, prompt engineering, custom fine-tunes and software engineering required to ship a valuable application on top of that interface counts as "building an app" in my book.
- bfeynman 3y agohow can you finetune gpt-4 or 3.5? The shell/wrapper around a request to open AI is not any worthy piece of software, It'd be more impressive to vend those services. Otherwise it's basically just a few scripts.
- thethimble 3y agoGoogle has recently announced infrastructure for fine tuning and RLHF on their pre trained foundation models. I imagine all cloud providers will follow suit. https://cloud.google.com/vertex-ai/docs/generative-ai/models/tune-models https://cloud.google.com/vertex-ai/docs/generative-ai/models...
- inductive_magic 3y agoAs your wording implies, finetuning is restricted to the smaller models, i.e. babbage, curie etc. You can generate the training data for this with 3.5 and 4 and tune smaller models with the resulting data. For lots of tasks, this results in robust results, which btw are also faster than 3.5 turbo.
- icapybara 3y agoThe LLM _is_ the product. Everything else in the stack is window dressing. I don’t think OpenAI’s contribution should be so understated- they built a technology that was considered science fiction just a few years ago. They deserve all the credit for the “AI”.
- ngngngng 3y agoGood luck building a moat when 95% of your app is just calling the API everyone else has access to.
- inductive_magic 3y ago100% of all existing code is just calling an OS-API that everyone else has access to. That's just nonsense
- nsxwolf 3y agoYes, but also, come on now.
- grrrate 3y ago[dead]
- inductive_magic 3y agoI mean, it refutes the argument. Everyone has access to the internet, to conv nets, to C/python/pandas/TCP, you name it. Yet, nobody would seriously argue that one can not build a moat with products based on those stacks for the reason that everyone else has access to the same stack. Its just not an argument, at all. We can now write software that interprets language under the hood (to some degree). The value propositions enabled by this change in the world are so vast, and partly so complex - to make absolute statements like "yeah but you don't control the model, so anyone can copy your solution" seems out of touch to me. What subset of technology doesn't get reverse engineered? Either this applies almost nowhere (because every piece of tech that an engineer can get their hands on is effectively open), or everywhere.
- icapybara 3y agoAnyone can build an OS without needing billions of dollars, and in fact there are state of the art open source OSes. Not quite the same.
- forgingahead 3y ago
- inductive_magic 3y agoI wasn't trying to understate OpenAI's contribution, far from it. I can hardly express my appreciation for their work. That doesn't mean that everything else in the stack is window dressing though - custom, domain specific wrangling with the different api endpoints, finding a satisfying prompt, temperature param etc. for specific tasks - the entire process of designing systems around an LLM-api has many intricacies to it, lots of which are completely uncharted territory. I can assure you: very smart people are knees deep in this process, and they deserve the credit for their share of the value that is being created.
- whimsicalism 3y agoI am not convinced it won’t all be obviated with improvements in the foundation model. Seems to be carving out a very very temporary space for yourself.
- inductive_magic 3y agoRe: smart people avoiding wrapper work - sure! Not just because the result might be short lived, but also because there is a lot more prestige in building something from scratch rather than wrapping. However, the "very very temporary space" might as well lead to momentum and a moat in a subdomain, and anyone who met a sufficiently large number of smart people knows that lots of them are very pragmatic, don't chase prestige, and enjoy laying ground work for future iterations.
- sharkjacobs 3y ago> The engine _is_ the product. Everything else in the car is window dressing.
- icapybara 3y agoInteresting analogy, since the engine manufacturer also manufactures the car.
- golergka 3y agoI think that people who believe this don't realise how complex and nuanced code surrounding LLMs have gotten in the last half a year.
- Zvez 3y agowhile this is technically correct, difference is that your product won't survive without openai at this point. If you need the model quality openai provides you are stuck and your product can just disappear. Because llm is core building block, irreplaceable one.
- JohnFen 3y agoBuilding a product that relies 100% on a single external vendor is taking a huge risk. So many companies have been burned by this in the past that it's amazing anyone doesn't see it as a risky thing. So I have to believe that the people making these products are intending to make as much cash as possible up front and aren't aiming for a long-term thing.
- cudgy 3y agoUse the facade pattern so it’s easier to swap out if needed.
- JohnFen 3y ago> required to ship a valuable application on top of that interface counts as "building an app" in my book. It's certainly building an app. It's not building an AI app, though. It's building a front-end to an existing AI application.
- raxxorraxor 3y agoOf course it is an app, but ultimately it is just a frontend.
- throwaway292939 3y agoIt's just like building a Facebook app back in the day Replace social media / graph APIs with the ones from OpenAI