3 ms·

It doesn't matter if they mind or not, the question is whether they can feasibly stop you. So far, the answer seems to be "not really".

usewik 6d ago
Good point. The other corollary is: why would you want to, if you can solve your problem by more easily finding and reusing existing building blocks with a bit of glue code.
gspr 6d ago
They can just change their EULA to make the act akin to old fashioned piracy. The free software movement eschews such instruments by definition, so we're fucked.
- Pannoniae 6d ago
  I mean, they can write anything in their EULA, I'm talking about enforcement. Sure, most free software advocates are squeamish about good old fashioned piracy today but I don't think that's an immutable fact of life. The best anyone can do is send takedowns to GitHub / other websites hosting the code or downloads but it's trivial to upload them to random russian code forges or whatever.
layer8 6d ago
It’s become pretty difficult in some areas due to cryptographic signatures that are either bound to the hardware or to online services. Apple has feasibly stopped any modifications of iOS and their apps, for all practical purposes. These kinds of ecosystems will only continue to expand and to displace more open ones. We’re already at the point where arguably the most performant non-server hardware (Macs with the latest SoCs) is bound to a proprietary OS. Efforts like Asahi can easily be shut down by Apple with newer hardware. LLMs are no help against proper cryptographic lockdown.
- Pannoniae 6d ago
  That's right, but other closed systems are kind of withering away (the two major consoles - Xbox and Playstation - are dying in favour of PC gaming). We're at an inflection point because hardware progress has slowed down and while the mobile duopoly does benefit from network effects, in the long run those are outweighed by missteps by the incumbents. See how Windows has been a monopoly on the PC market for ages, then they've dropped the ball, Linux has grown then Microsoft got their shit together somewhat in order to catch up. I don't think open / general-purpose computing is doomed in the future or anything like that, as long as there is demand for it, someone will supply it. And LLMs can also help you design your own hardware in the worst case:)
  - layer8 6d ago
    > the two major consoles - Xbox and Playstation - are dying in favour of PC gaming I’m pretty sure that it’s in favor of mobile gaming. The PC market is shrinking. > And LLMs can also help you design your own hardware in the worst case:) But not in manufacturing it. You’ll generally be even more disadvantaged in terms of hardware performance than open-weight models are compared to the proprietary frontier models.
    - Pannoniae 6d ago
      >The PC market is shrinking. You have very good points but I'd say this is somewhat of a fallacy. If you look at graphs for phone shipments and PC shipments, they're both somewhat declining between 2015-2025 (I'm focusing on this time period to exclude the current temporary component shortages). However, this doesn't mean they're becoming less popular in either usage or platform spending like buying apps, games and subscriptions. How can this circle be squared you might ask? Just about everyone has a phone or a laptop today. They're typically not first-time buyers, they'll be replacing their systems. Even if the number of devices shipped are decreasing today, doesn't mean the market itself has shrunk. Even if for some reason, all laptops became e-waste from next year January 1st, you'd see several hundred million sales next year for the replacement device, because the market is there. For those consoles, that's not the case. (src: https://www.gamesindustry.biz/analyst-game-console-shipments-expected-to-decline-195-to-339m-units-in-2026 https://www.gamesindustry.biz/analyst-game-console-shipments...) Look at how Switch is the majority of shipments most of the time, and there are years where traditional consoles sell only a few million copies. Contrast that to the personal computer or the phone market where the numbers are in the tens of millions or hundreds each year. It's just not comparable. >But not in manufacturing it. LLMs won't build you a frontier fab that's for sure, but the point is that you don't necessarily need the latest'n'greatest with diminishing returns. An RTX 5090 is like ten times faster than a GTX 980 released 12 years ago. It doesn't run games which are ten times better. Similarly, something like the Galaxy S26 is ~7 times faster than an S6 around that time. Is it seven times better to use? Of course not :P So the conclusion is that the performance the architecture you need to reach isn't an ever-racing frontier, you can make a new product (and in this hypothetical case, a product focused on openness) without having SOTA performance. For a case of an "alternate" product like this, just see the Switch - much slower than "normal" consoles, good form factor, portable, and fairly cheap to produce. No one cares that it doesn't do 4K when undocked.

usewik 6d ago

Good point. The other corollary is: why would you want to, if you can solve your problem by more easily finding and reusing existing building blocks with a bit of glue code.

gspr 6d ago

They can just change their EULA to make the act akin to old fashioned piracy. The free software movement eschews such instruments by definition, so we're fucked.

Pannoniae 6d ago
I mean, they can write anything in their EULA, I'm talking about enforcement. Sure, most free software advocates are squeamish about good old fashioned piracy today but I don't think that's an immutable fact of life. The best anyone can do is send takedowns to GitHub / other websites hosting the code or downloads but it's trivial to upload them to random russian code forges or whatever.

layer8 6d ago

It’s become pretty difficult in some areas due to cryptographic signatures that are either bound to the hardware or to online services. Apple has feasibly stopped any modifications of iOS and their apps, for all practical purposes. These kinds of ecosystems will only continue to expand and to displace more open ones. We’re already at the point where arguably the most performant non-server hardware (Macs with the latest SoCs) is bound to a proprietary OS. Efforts like Asahi can easily be shut down by Apple with newer hardware. LLMs are no help against proper cryptographic lockdown.

Pannoniae 6d ago
That's right, but other closed systems are kind of withering away (the two major consoles - Xbox and Playstation - are dying in favour of PC gaming). We're at an inflection point because hardware progress has slowed down and while the mobile duopoly does benefit from network effects, in the long run those are outweighed by missteps by the incumbents. See how Windows has been a monopoly on the PC market for ages, then they've dropped the ball, Linux has grown then Microsoft got their shit together somewhat in order to catch up. I don't think open / general-purpose computing is doomed in the future or anything like that, as long as there is demand for it, someone will supply it. And LLMs can also help you design your own hardware in the worst case:)
- layer8 6d ago
  > the two major consoles - Xbox and Playstation - are dying in favour of PC gaming I’m pretty sure that it’s in favor of mobile gaming. The PC market is shrinking. > And LLMs can also help you design your own hardware in the worst case:) But not in manufacturing it. You’ll generally be even more disadvantaged in terms of hardware performance than open-weight models are compared to the proprietary frontier models.
  - Pannoniae 6d ago
    >The PC market is shrinking. You have very good points but I'd say this is somewhat of a fallacy. If you look at graphs for phone shipments and PC shipments, they're both somewhat declining between 2015-2025 (I'm focusing on this time period to exclude the current temporary component shortages). However, this doesn't mean they're becoming less popular in either usage or platform spending like buying apps, games and subscriptions. How can this circle be squared you might ask? Just about everyone has a phone or a laptop today. They're typically not first-time buyers, they'll be replacing their systems. Even if the number of devices shipped are decreasing today, doesn't mean the market itself has shrunk. Even if for some reason, all laptops became e-waste from next year January 1st, you'd see several hundred million sales next year for the replacement device, because the market is there. For those consoles, that's not the case. (src: https://www.gamesindustry.biz/analyst-game-console-shipments-expected-to-decline-195-to-339m-units-in-2026 https://www.gamesindustry.biz/analyst-game-console-shipments...) Look at how Switch is the majority of shipments most of the time, and there are years where traditional consoles sell only a few million copies. Contrast that to the personal computer or the phone market where the numbers are in the tens of millions or hundreds each year. It's just not comparable. >But not in manufacturing it. LLMs won't build you a frontier fab that's for sure, but the point is that you don't necessarily need the latest'n'greatest with diminishing returns. An RTX 5090 is like ten times faster than a GTX 980 released 12 years ago. It doesn't run games which are ten times better. Similarly, something like the Galaxy S26 is ~7 times faster than an S6 around that time. Is it seven times better to use? Of course not :P So the conclusion is that the performance the architecture you need to reach isn't an ever-racing frontier, you can make a new product (and in this hypothetical case, a product focused on openness) without having SOTA performance. For a case of an "alternate" product like this, just see the Switch - much slower than "normal" consoles, good form factor, portable, and fairly cheap to produce. No one cares that it doesn't do 4K when undocked.