Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Long Live the 'GPU Poor' – Open-Source AI Grants

a16z.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 124 posts

Re: Long Live the 'GPU Poor' – Open-Source AI Grants

#101

Post by tikkun »

Michelangelo11 wrote: post #5

This is great, but I'm not seeing anything about how to apply, or really anything about the application and selection process at all. Is this by design?

My guess is that they'll prefer to get nominations.

Having once done a grant application process - I think their approach is smart.

If they opened grant applications, they'd get thousands of (sadly mostly very low quality) applications. It's extremely hard to vet.

It's a much safer bet to wait until projects are already popular in the community, already being relied on by people, and where those devs would love to spend more time on their open source projects but they're limited by money.

Yes, the downside of this is that some people could make things happen if they were given money first. But, if I was them, I'd still prefer to do what they're doing and pick projects that are already successful and give grants to those.

(This isn't a comment about your project specifically, for all I know your project might be a popular open source LLM project that lots of people already rely on, in which case they probably already know about your project and will probably reach out to you for the second round, is my guess)

Re: Long Live the 'GPU Poor' – Open-Source AI Grants

#102

Post by tikkun »

samstave wrote: post #76
rajko_rad wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

in most cases the teams already had their own source or platform of choice!

Maybe build a FAQ for others on how to accomplish, or resources you can point people at?

I've done a version of this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36632397

Let me know what you'd want to see added!

Re: Long Live the 'GPU Poor' – Open-Source AI Grants

#103

Post by rajko_rad »

brailsafe wrote: post #100
itissid wrote: post #58

Noob Q: If I have 25000$ can I buy some GPUs and support the effort for supporting GPU Poor? Like is there a DIYer's guide to do this? I don't want to donate the cash but instead set up a handful of GPUs(Somehow?) and let people pay at cost to use them.

No intention to attribute malice, but wouldn't this be more like buying a condo and renting it out to pay your mortgage rather than donating resources?

we didn't buy a condo haha, are letting people choose their own housing :)

Re: Long Live the 'GPU Poor' – Open-Source AI Grants

#104

Post by rajko_rad »

tikkun wrote: post #81

What are other open source LLM projects that people rely on? As a way to come up with ideas for future grant recipients. This is a good initiative, and an excellent initial batch. A great use of management fees! I'm struggling to think of additional ones because I feel like this covers everyone I would've suggested (particularly TheBloke, vLLM and oobabooga). Edit, some ideas for future grant recipients would be: * M…

Awesome suggestions, thank you!

Re: Long Live the 'GPU Poor' – Open-Source AI Grants

#105

Post by jph00 »

I'm one of the recipients of the AI grants, to support my work at fast.ai. I'm extremely grateful to a16z for their support. Here's some additional details based on questions I see in the comments:

My grant covered the purchase of a Scalar server from Lambda Labs, which allowed me to configure a system with 8 previous-gen A6000 GPUs, partly also thanks to NVIDIA who has recently given me 3 of those cards, and Lambda Labs who offered to provide everything at cost.

a16z didn't ask for any equity or any kind of quid pro quo, other than to let folks know that they provided this grant. They couldn't have been more helpful through the process - I didn't have to fill out any forms (other than sign a single one page agreement), the contract was clear and totally fair (even explicitly saying that a16z wasn't going to receive any kind of rights to anything), and they wired me the money for buying the server promptly.

Re: Long Live the 'GPU Poor' – Open-Source AI Grants

#106

Post by evanwolf »

seism wrote: post #71

Hi Robin Hood. I wonder about the "continue their work without the pressure to generate financial returns" part. I don't see an expectation to work on non-commercial, or socially conscious, applications, just to commit to open source (what level of commitment also being unclear). It would actually be great if support programs along these lines were being offered by governments and public service institutions, with so…

Yeah, this is moneyed interests looking out for their own investments instead of government acting on behalf of the public good.

Re: Long Live the 'GPU Poor' – Open-Source AI Grants

#107

Post by Mascobot »

jph00 wrote: post #105

I'm one of the recipients of the AI grants, to support my work at fast.ai. I'm extremely grateful to a16z for their support. Here's some additional details based on questions I see in the comments: My grant covered the purchase of a Scalar server from Lambda Labs, which allowed me to configure a system with 8 previous-gen A6000 GPUs, partly also thanks to NVIDIA who has recently given me 3 of those cards, and Lambda…

Thanks for all the work Jeremy! There's a large community of folks that have been learning from you, the Fast.ai community and your work. Super excited for this grant!

Re: Long Live the 'GPU Poor' – Open-Source AI Grants

#108

Post by evanwolf »

svnt wrote: post #15

“We are disguising this round of seed funding as a grant, accomplishing all of the below: 1) brand-washing for people who don’t do the math 2) avoiding angering our LPs and/or violating our fund theses and 3) getting in on the ground floor of things that might follow OpenAI through the non-profit-to-VC-darling door Thanks for reading our press release, feel free to try to apply using your personal network (somehow) b…

This is insurance for their already huge investments (and future rounds) in AI businesses. It's a pittance relative to everything else they have at risk. It's prudent since failure of small projects like these can delay work on profitable corporate efforts.

Re: Long Live the 'GPU Poor' – Open-Source AI Grants

#109

Post by rajko_rad »

Mascobot wrote: post #107
jph00 wrote: post #105

I'm one of the recipients of the AI grants, to support my work at fast.ai. I'm extremely grateful to a16z for their support. Here's some additional details based on questions I see in the comments: My grant covered the purchase of a Scalar server from Lambda Labs, which allowed me to configure a system with 8 previous-gen A6000 GPUs, partly also thanks to NVIDIA who has recently given me 3 of those cards, and Lambda…

Thanks for all the work Jeremy! There's a large community of folks that have been learning from you, the Fast.ai community and your work. Super excited for this grant!

Honored to have you in the inaugural cohort @jph00!!

Re: Long Live the 'GPU Poor' – Open-Source AI Grants

#110

Post by jasrys »

jph00 wrote: post #105

I'm one of the recipients of the AI grants, to support my work at fast.ai. I'm extremely grateful to a16z for their support. Here's some additional details based on questions I see in the comments: My grant covered the purchase of a Scalar server from Lambda Labs, which allowed me to configure a system with 8 previous-gen A6000 GPUs, partly also thanks to NVIDIA who has recently given me 3 of those cards, and Lambda…

Couldn't go to a better home. Thanks for making this field approachable.
Post reply on HN