3 ms·

Interesting. Europe is really putting up a fight for once. I'm into it.

resource_waste 1y ago
Expected this comment. Mistral has been consistently last place, or at least last place among ChatGPT, Claude, Llama, and Gemini/Gemma. I know this because I had to use a permissive license for a side project and I was tortured by how miserably bad Mistral was, and how much better every other LLM was. Need the best? ChatGPT Need local stuff? Llama(maybe Gemma) Need to do barely legal things that break most company's TOS? Mistral... although deepseek probably beats it in 2025. For people outside Europe, we don't have patriotism for our LLMs, we just use the best. Mistral has barely any usecase.
- byefruit 1y ago
  You are probably getting downvoted because you don't give any model generations or versions ('ChatGPT') which makes this not very credible.
  - resource_waste 1y ago
    [flagged]
    - dismalaf 1y ago
      In your first comment you mentioned you used Mistral because of its permissive license (so guessing you used 7B, right?). Then you compare it to a bunch of cutting edge proprietary models. Have you tried Mistral's newest and proprietary models? Or even their newest open model?
    - thrance 1y ago
      "patriotic Europeans" is an... interesting combination of words. I'd almost call it an oxymoron.
      - palata 1y ago
        To me that's a clue that it's written by an American :-).
        bluebarbet 1y ago
        Interesting. I'd say that Americans tend to overestimate the degree of common identity among Europeans. The polls are clear: for most Europeans, their European identity comes a distant second. The EU in particular is an elitist project and it's only slowly gaining popular legitimacy. That said, I personally am a very patriotic European.
- omneity 1y ago
  > Need local stuff? Llama(maybe Gemma) You probably want to replace Llama with Qwen in there. And Gemma is not even close. > Mistral has been consistently last place, or at least last place among ChatGPT, Claude, Llama, and Gemini/Gemma. Mistral held for a long time the position of "workhorse open-weights base model" and nothing precludes them from taking it again with some smart positioning. They might not currently be leading a category, but as an outside observer I could see them (like Cohere) actively trying to find innovative business models to survive, reach PMF and keep the dream going, and I find that very laudable. I expect them to experiment a lot during this phase, and that probably means not doubling down on any particular niche until they find a strong signal.
  - drilbo 1y ago
    >You probably want to replace Llama with Qwen in there. And Gemma is not even close. Have you tried the latest, gemma3? I've been pretty impressed with it. Altho I do agree that qwen3 quickly overshadowed it, it seems too soon to dismiss it altogether. EG, the 3~4b and smaller versions of gemma seem to freak out way less frequently than similar param size qwen versions, tho I haven't been able to rule out quant and other factors in this just yet. It's very difficult to fault anyone for not keeping up with the latest SOTA in this space. The fact we have several options that anyone can serviceably run, even on mobile, is just incredible. Anyway, i agree that Mistral is worth keeping an eye on. They played a huge part in pushing the other players toward open weights and proving smaller models can have a place at the table. While I personally can't get that excited about a closed model, it's definitely nice to see they haven't tapped out.
    - omneity 1y ago
      It's probably subjective to your own use, but for me Gemma3 is not particularly usable (i.e. not competitive or delivering a particular value for me to make use of it). Qwen 2.5 14B blows Gemma 27B out of the water for my use. Qwen 2.5 3B is also very competitive. The 3 series is even more interesting with the 0.6B model actually useful for basic tasks and not just a curiosity. Where I find Qwen relatively lackluster is its complete lack of personality.
- tacker2000 1y ago
  Whats your point here? There is a place for a European LLM, be it “patriotism” or data safety. And dont tell me the Chinese are not “patriotic” about their stuff. Everyone has a different approach. If Mistral fits the market, they will be successful.
- amelius 1y ago
  I certainly had some opposite experiences lately, where Mistral was outperforming Chatgpt for some hard questions.
- lysace 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - _bin_ 1y ago
    [flagged]
fortifAI 1y ago
Mistral isn't really Europe, it's France. Europe has some plans but as far as I can tell their goal isn't to make something that can really compete. The goal is to make EU data stay in the EU for businesses, meanwhile every user that is not forced by their company sends their data to the US or China.
- blitzar 1y ago
  Last I checked France is in Europe. It would be like saying Google or Apple are not American because they are in California.
  - klabb3 1y ago
    The big picture incongruence in the thread is using terms as patriotic, allegories to US states, which imo is but a US-centric projection. Even proponents don’t think of the EU to be a supreme government with federated states, and they certainly don’t think of ”Europeans” as a unified demographic. At best, the EU protects against stupid shit from other EU countries (tariffs, freedom of movement) and stupid shit against the outside, such as bullying by superpowers like Russia, China and recently also the US, or extremely large corporations who can take on smaller nation states. The EU is more similar to NAFTA or five eyes, and culturally the loyalty is more similar to the US vs the anglosphere, like how Americans think of Australia, UK and Canada. Well, again, until recently. Things are changing fast.
    - r0p3 1y ago
      The NAFTA Parliament
      - klabb3 1y ago
        Yes, analogies do have differences. And parliament is better than handshakes behind closed doors, even if it’s not perfect. Comparing to states is much more far fetched. The UK left the union without any serious retaliation, let alone military conflict. What would happen if Texas or California tried to secede seriously?

Expected this comment. Mistral has been consistently last place, or at least last place among ChatGPT, Claude, Llama, and Gemini/Gemma. I know this because I had to use a permissive license for a side project and I was tortured by how miserably bad Mistral was, and how much better every other LLM was. Need the best? ChatGPT Need local stuff? Llama(maybe Gemma) Need to do barely legal things that break most company's TOS? Mistral... although deepseek probably beats it in 2025. For people outside Europe, we don't have patriotism for our LLMs, we just use the best. Mistral has barely any usecase.

byefruit 1y ago
You are probably getting downvoted because you don't give any model generations or versions ('ChatGPT') which makes this not very credible.
- resource_waste 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - dismalaf 1y ago
    In your first comment you mentioned you used Mistral because of its permissive license (so guessing you used 7B, right?). Then you compare it to a bunch of cutting edge proprietary models. Have you tried Mistral's newest and proprietary models? Or even their newest open model?
  - thrance 1y ago
    "patriotic Europeans" is an... interesting combination of words. I'd almost call it an oxymoron.
    - palata 1y ago
      To me that's a clue that it's written by an American :-).
      - bluebarbet 1y ago
        Interesting. I'd say that Americans tend to overestimate the degree of common identity among Europeans. The polls are clear: for most Europeans, their European identity comes a distant second. The EU in particular is an elitist project and it's only slowly gaining popular legitimacy. That said, I personally am a very patriotic European.
omneity 1y ago
> Need local stuff? Llama(maybe Gemma) You probably want to replace Llama with Qwen in there. And Gemma is not even close. > Mistral has been consistently last place, or at least last place among ChatGPT, Claude, Llama, and Gemini/Gemma. Mistral held for a long time the position of "workhorse open-weights base model" and nothing precludes them from taking it again with some smart positioning. They might not currently be leading a category, but as an outside observer I could see them (like Cohere) actively trying to find innovative business models to survive, reach PMF and keep the dream going, and I find that very laudable. I expect them to experiment a lot during this phase, and that probably means not doubling down on any particular niche until they find a strong signal.
- drilbo 1y ago
  >You probably want to replace Llama with Qwen in there. And Gemma is not even close. Have you tried the latest, gemma3? I've been pretty impressed with it. Altho I do agree that qwen3 quickly overshadowed it, it seems too soon to dismiss it altogether. EG, the 3~4b and smaller versions of gemma seem to freak out way less frequently than similar param size qwen versions, tho I haven't been able to rule out quant and other factors in this just yet. It's very difficult to fault anyone for not keeping up with the latest SOTA in this space. The fact we have several options that anyone can serviceably run, even on mobile, is just incredible. Anyway, i agree that Mistral is worth keeping an eye on. They played a huge part in pushing the other players toward open weights and proving smaller models can have a place at the table. While I personally can't get that excited about a closed model, it's definitely nice to see they haven't tapped out.
  - omneity 1y ago
    It's probably subjective to your own use, but for me Gemma3 is not particularly usable (i.e. not competitive or delivering a particular value for me to make use of it). Qwen 2.5 14B blows Gemma 27B out of the water for my use. Qwen 2.5 3B is also very competitive. The 3 series is even more interesting with the 0.6B model actually useful for basic tasks and not just a curiosity. Where I find Qwen relatively lackluster is its complete lack of personality.
tacker2000 1y ago
Whats your point here? There is a place for a European LLM, be it “patriotism” or data safety. And dont tell me the Chinese are not “patriotic” about their stuff. Everyone has a different approach. If Mistral fits the market, they will be successful.
amelius 1y ago
I certainly had some opposite experiences lately, where Mistral was outperforming Chatgpt for some hard questions.
lysace 1y ago
[flagged]
- _bin_ 1y ago
  [flagged]

fortifAI 1y ago

Mistral isn't really Europe, it's France. Europe has some plans but as far as I can tell their goal isn't to make something that can really compete. The goal is to make EU data stay in the EU for businesses, meanwhile every user that is not forced by their company sends their data to the US or China.

blitzar 1y ago
Last I checked France is in Europe. It would be like saying Google or Apple are not American because they are in California.
- klabb3 1y ago
  The big picture incongruence in the thread is using terms as patriotic, allegories to US states, which imo is but a US-centric projection. Even proponents don’t think of the EU to be a supreme government with federated states, and they certainly don’t think of ”Europeans” as a unified demographic. At best, the EU protects against stupid shit from other EU countries (tariffs, freedom of movement) and stupid shit against the outside, such as bullying by superpowers like Russia, China and recently also the US, or extremely large corporations who can take on smaller nation states. The EU is more similar to NAFTA or five eyes, and culturally the loyalty is more similar to the US vs the anglosphere, like how Americans think of Australia, UK and Canada. Well, again, until recently. Things are changing fast.
  - r0p3 1y ago
    The NAFTA Parliament
    - klabb3 1y ago
      Yes, analogies do have differences. And parliament is better than handshakes behind closed doors, even if it’s not perfect. Comparing to states is much more far fetched. The UK left the union without any serious retaliation, let alone military conflict. What would happen if Texas or California tried to secede seriously?