AI's top startups are barely publishing their research • Hacker News Board

Re: AI's top startups are barely publishing their research

#111

Post by thinkzilla » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 1:25 AM UTC

Aurornis wrote: post #39

KoolKat23 wrote: post #3

Perhaps I'm imagining it but the entire industry was build on published research, this "AI wave" is at odds with that and seems to be driven by greed (although they'll claim some arms race or something to help themselves sleep at night). There should be a new ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) policy being pushed recognizing the important role this plays. Although ESG and all norms have been set aside in thi…

> Perhaps I'm imagining it but the entire industry was build on public research There is some excellent publicly-funded research in there, but pivotal papers like Attention Is All You Need and the numerous pivotal OpenAI publications were privately funded. OpenAI is at the top of the chart in the study. I think you're bringing some assumptions into this conversation that aren't supported by the evidence.

The Attention Is All You Need paper deserves a lot of credit, but it also builds on other ideas. Earlier versions of attention were introduced in 2014 papers from (not U.S.) universities.

Re: AI's top startups are barely publishing their research

#112

Post by fluoridation » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 1:28 AM UTC

eikenberry wrote: post #83

noosphr wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article is complaining that research isn't peer reviewed and research is turning into blogs. I'm explaining why that's the best outcome possible and why in a field as hot as large dl models you won't even get that.

I thought parent post was saying that they didn't publish them at all after they had so much trouble with the journals. If they did publish the papers themselves then I don't see the problem. The article itself read to me as your standard journal rent seeking and I wasn't really responding to it.

>Why wouldn't they just skip the journals and publish the papers themselves? Sharing the research is the important part

To answer your question, sharing the research isn't the important part. These are researchers in the private sector, in a highly competitive field. Arguably, doing the research isn't the important part either. The important part is making money, and the research is a means to that end. Publishing the research doesn't further that goal, and, according to GP, it's so difficult that it may not be worthwhile trying.

Re: AI's top startups are barely publishing their research

#113

Post by verdverm » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 1:28 AM UTC

beloch wrote: post #84

"But University of Alberta AI ethicist Mohamed Abdalla says the findings reflect the incentives facing commercial AI developers, rather than solely a failure to uphold scientific norms. “It’s not the company’s job to advance science, right?” he says. “The company’s job is to advance money.”" ------------ If everyone holds back their publications, the whole sector moves slower. Yes, it's moving alarmingly fast accordi…

> is it moving fast enough that the massive investments in data centres will actually pay off?

It may be moving so fast that they do not pay off, i.e. they get commoditized too fast. This all depends on Ai demand in the end. If you can keep the GPUs saturated (at a profitable rate), then it really shouldn't matter how much a token costs. If you bought too many GPUs, or paid to much for them in a hype cycle, you may need higher token prices to ROI than the market wants to pay given alternatives.

Re: AI's top startups are barely publishing their research

#114

Post by thinkzilla » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 1:29 AM UTC

I'm under the impression that the majority of startups go nowhere, so the fact that they don't have this property is not itself a major statement about the field as a whole.

Re: AI's top startups are barely publishing their research

#115

Post by sillysaurusx » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 1:29 AM UTC

ninjahawk1 wrote: post #90

I can’t speak for other startups, but I applied to the most recent YC batch with my idea for making AI proactive instead of reactive, and pre-being selected I’ve published a paper on recursive self-improvement mapped to the Epoch AI data. I contacted a professor from a university in the UK and he responded since he was working on similar work, then asked me if I wanted to meet with him. We talked for about an hour si…

That's also a reason the big labs stopped. Publishing is most valuable to people who have no other way to get the attention of smart strangers. Once you can hire nearly anyone and everyone already returns your calls, the main remaining effect of publishing is to tell your competitors which things worked.

This is what happens to every field as it turns from a science into an industry. Chemists published freely until dyes started being worth money, and then the interesting work moved into company labs and stopped coming out.

Re: AI's top startups are barely publishing their research

#116

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 1:30 AM UTC

Aurornis wrote: post #44

KoolKat23 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry I mean published i.e. available to the public.

I was also referring to published papers available to the public. Like I said, I think you're bringing some assumptions to this conversation that aren't based on the how the industry came about.

[deleted]

Re: AI's top startups are barely publishing their research

#117

Post by verdverm » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 1:31 AM UTC

neves wrote: post #95

Do they receive public funds?

Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump have plans that would put lots of public money into the biggest Ai companies (sovereign wealth fund). They are getting a lot of money through government contracts, which is ultimately funded by the public through taxes.

How we wish to consider public funding and required sharing of gains is an open debate.

Re: AI's top startups are barely publishing their research

#118

Post by geysersam » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 1:31 AM UTC

lenerdenator wrote: post #106

cortesoft wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That and avoiding openAI and Anthropic copying our results and leaving us with nothing to show for six months of work. Isn't the POINT of publishing research because you want others to copy it?

For researchers, yes. For startups, no, because the point of that is to make money.

So why is op trying to publish?

Re: AI's top startups are barely publishing their research

#119

Post by holografix » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 1:33 AM UTC

Frontier AI research is not only under incredible commercial pressure but it’s also a geopolitical advantage.

I don’t think Dario wants to be a monopolist. But history is full of brilliant people who focused on the social good as priority #1 and lost the game early.

Once you lose the game and go bankrupt you can’t do anything. Same as politics, if you’re not elected you can’t change anything. Of course there are many lines not worth crossing.

Re: AI's top startups are barely publishing their research

#120

Post by fluoridation » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 1:34 AM UTC

s1artibartfast wrote: post #61

sndgndgndgndy wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Science is a method of inquiry, not an institution or group of people with titles.

Sure, but it is good that people actually adhere to that method if inquiry. They are not perfect, but institutions like peer review or universities do provide a framework and incentives for quality.

Eh. Peer review isn't central to science. The point of peer review is: you have a claim someone makes; if it's been peer-reviewed, you can build further research on it without having verify the claim yourself. If you're building technology directly, any result you use you're going to verify inherently, because it either works as advertised or your tech doesn't work. The external verification doesn't add that much in that case.