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Can Europe train a frontier AI model on the compute it owns?

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Re: Can Europe train a frontier AI model on the compute it owns?

#131

Post by aleph_minus_one »

epolanski wrote: post #34
cmiles8 wrote: post #22

The question was never do enough computers exist in Europe, but rather can Europe organize the capital and cross-company / cross-border relationships required to build a big model at scale. There the answer still looks iffy at best. This is where the US has, and continues to, thrive and where Europe can’t get out of its own way.

I don't believe Europe can build models that can compete with American ones. 1. In order to build competitive models, you need to offer competitive salaries and equity. Europe has very old and inadequate corporate law virtually everywhere but in UK. European labs cannot attract talent that can build such competitive models with the proper lack of incentives. 2. In order to build competitive models, you need gargantua…

> In order to build competitive models, you need to offer competitive salaries and equity. Europe has very old and inadequate corporate law virtually everywhere but in UK.

It is a fact that a much smaller amount of money is available in the EU for startup investments.

But in which sense it the corporate law inadequate? As far as I am aware the laws allow quite a lot of freedom in setting up the corporate governance for many forms of companies.

Re: Can Europe train a frontier AI model on the compute it owns?

#132

Post by ben_w »

TMWNN wrote: post #76
dofm wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't think US states compete with, undercut and stifle each other? Second question: you think the USA has a strong federal government? I mean that is actually an open question even in non-Trump years, not least when one side of the political aisle was famously dedicated to shrinking it down so small it could be "drowned in a bathtub", to quote one of its more famous assholes.

>You don't think US states compete with, undercut and stifle each other? Compete with each other, yes. But all US states take pride in Silicon Valley being American. No EU project for its own "Silicon Valley" can succeed, because the French would insist on it being in France, Germans would insist on Germany, Dutch in the Netherlands, etc.

> No EU project for its own "Silicon Valley" can succeed, because the French would insist on it being in France, Germans would insist on Germany, Dutch in the Netherlands, etc.

France and Germany and the Netherlands may compete with each other to attract VC and tech firms, but they're ultimately no more capable of preventing each other from getting a runaway success loop than New York and Utah were at preventing California from getting actual Silicon Valley.

The EU as an institution just doesn't wield any magic wand of creating things like that to be fought over, just like Washington DC also doesn't.

Re: Can Europe train a frontier AI model on the compute it owns?

#133

Post by rootlocus »

pfdietz wrote: post #114
rootlocus wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regulations aside, Europe is extremely divided. There's constant resistance from individual states, disputes and far right extremism gaining traction. At this point, it seems like EU can barely agree to make any decision.

Well-meaning restrictions that threaten Europe's ability to compete sound like something that would eventually encourage far right extremism by impeaching the validity of the restrictions' philosophical underpinnings.

In my experience it doesn't take anything that ample to encourage far right extremism. It's enough to point at an existing problem and a convincing scapegoat. It works today not eventually and it works regardless of any reason or reality.

It's true though that multiple problems mean multiple propaganda seeds.

Re: Can Europe train a frontier AI model on the compute it owns?

#134

Post by bluegatty »

mmarq wrote: post #102
rootlocus wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We can debate the details and implementation but EU legislature is, at least in spirit, trying to protect human rights. What does it say about progress that the same laws that protect human rights also stifle innovation?

EU legislature is an actual corpus of laws. It’s imperfect, but it’s arguably better than having a guy that can block a model or threat companies because they crossed him.

No it's not.

Europe has no models to even block.

The US has a guy who occasionally can screw things up for a few weeks, but who will be gone in a while.

You have it upside down: the innovation and the stuff is the valuable thing, the laws are there to help us organize ourselves a bit after the fact. They're always a secondary concern to the extent that the vast majority of civilization is working with one another, doing material things wherein the law usually is there as a backstop.

There are some ugly things here and there but by and large - 'cookie settings' has not materially improved people's lives - and not nearly as much as the innovations on the web themselves.

Doing is primacy, regulating is always secondary, with only a few exceptions.

The EU is in really really bad shape on industrial issues on a continental scale - 'too many regulations' is actually not a root cause (it's a big drag, but not root), but it's also not for the most part some kind of advantage.

You see the same thing play out with defence and other things.

Having to beg the US for help with Ukraine, for Patriot munitions, Starlink, advanced intel, for 5th Gen gear, mid range ballistic missiles - it's an existentially disempowering posture.

Human rights won't matter in the areas where the Russians have conquerd or destroyed. Again, here EU/Euro governance issues loom large.

'Do the thing' then as you go along, think about some guardrails or whatever, but the 'do the thing' is the hard part that deserves most of the focus.

Re: Can Europe train a frontier AI model on the compute it owns?

#135

Post by aleph_minus_one »

fragmede wrote: post #64
alecco wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1. In order to build competitive models, you need to offer competitive salaries and equity. FWIW, for the equity part there's a proposal expected to pass for next year: https://www.eu-inc.org/ (but it doesn't address taxes, cross-border employment, or anything significant so it's mostly moot). The main goal is to attract native VCs. AFAIK it's designed by lawyers and old money, with little to no input from tech ent…

The culture's still all wrong. If you have a startup that failed in SV, that's par for the course. Better luck next time! If you fail in the EU, that's the kiss of death. Your startup failed ???

> If you fail in the EU, that's the kiss of death. Your startup failed???

As a native German, I wouldn't say this is the case: the opinions of people rather differ quite a bit on this topic (there also exist quite a lot of people who are nearer to the US-American mentality here).

What I would rather claim is some kind of kiss of death, is if your startup failed because you made stupid mistakes. People don't like such unresponsible people (many people say that startup founders also have responsibility for their employees).

Re: Can Europe train a frontier AI model on the compute it owns?

#136

Post by htrp »

SyneRyder wrote: post #48
acatton wrote: post #28

What is this whole thing about Europe being behind on AI? Do Mistral and DeepL not exist? Yes, I know DeepL is niche, but IMHO it is the best translation model out there.

I've tried using Mistral for various tasks, and it is so far behind the American models that I just never bother using it despite still having lots of Mistral API credits leftover. Even their OCR and TTS products are surpassed by generic US models - I use regular Claude Sonnet for OCR because it is more accurate than Mistral OCR. I could rant about this, I am just so disappointed at how Mistral completely gave up and…

>Or they do understand and that's why they focus on consulting now.

Cohere would like a word here

Re: Can Europe train a frontier AI model on the compute it owns?

#137

Post by red75prime »

rootlocus wrote: post #38
beernet wrote: post #31

Absolutely not, even if Europe was given all of the compute in the world. The issues are much much worse. Starting at "data privacy", continuing with the "EU AI Act" and just an overall mindset of regulation and German angst. Many structures in the EU actively prevent and fight against innovation. Oftentimes more subtle but the consequences stay the same. If you ever had to use one of the "sovereign" AI provides such…

We can debate the details and implementation but EU legislature is, at least in spirit, trying to protect human rights. What does it say about progress that the same laws that protect human rights also stifle innovation?

> EU legislature is, at least in spirit, trying to protect human rights

Protect human rights as defined by EU legislature, obviously. And privacy in public places, for example, doesn't seem to be an undebatable human right.

Heck, I hate street views disfigured by huge privacy blobs.

Re: Can Europe train a frontier AI model on the compute it owns?

#138

Post by poszlem »

rootlocus wrote: post #38
beernet wrote: post #31

Absolutely not, even if Europe was given all of the compute in the world. The issues are much much worse. Starting at "data privacy", continuing with the "EU AI Act" and just an overall mindset of regulation and German angst. Many structures in the EU actively prevent and fight against innovation. Oftentimes more subtle but the consequences stay the same. If you ever had to use one of the "sovereign" AI provides such…

We can debate the details and implementation but EU legislature is, at least in spirit, trying to protect human rights. What does it say about progress that the same laws that protect human rights also stifle innovation?

That's a bit like arguing that the USSR was, in spirit, trying to defend workers' rights, and therefore we should not have opposed it. At some point, the gap between what something claims to be "in spirit" and what it actually is in practice becomes too large to ignore.

Re: Can Europe train a frontier AI model on the compute it owns?

#139

Post by mopsi »

red75prime wrote: post #137
rootlocus wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We can debate the details and implementation but EU legislature is, at least in spirit, trying to protect human rights. What does it say about progress that the same laws that protect human rights also stifle innovation?

> EU legislature is, at least in spirit, trying to protect human rights Protect human rights as defined by EU legislature, obviously. And privacy in public places, for example, doesn't seem to be an undebatable human right. Heck, I hate street views disfigured by huge privacy blobs.

  > Heck, I hate street views disfigured by huge privacy blobs.
Why should you - from the other side of the planet - have an unrestricted view into my front garden at your fingertips?
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