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NSF and Nvidia award Ai2 $152M to support building an open AI ecosystem

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Re: NSF and Nvidia award Ai2 $152M to support building an open AI ecosystem

#21

Post by victorbjorklund »

arthurcolle wrote: post #9
sounds wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nvidia is interested in commoditizing their complements. It's a business strategy to decrease the power of OpenAI (for instance). Nvidia dreams of a world where there are lots of "open" alternatives to OpenAI, like there are lots of open game engines and lots open software in general. All buying closed Nvidia chips.

Why is OpenAI a threat to Nvidia? They are still highly dependent on those GPUs

One large customer has more bargin power than many big ones. And risk is OpenAI would try to make their own chips if they capture all the market.

Re: NSF and Nvidia award Ai2 $152M to support building an open AI ecosystem

#22

Post by skybrian »

someone7x wrote: post #13
sounds wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nvidia is interested in commoditizing their complements. It's a business strategy to decrease the power of OpenAI (for instance). Nvidia dreams of a world where there are lots of "open" alternatives to OpenAI, like there are lots of open game engines and lots open software in general. All buying closed Nvidia chips.

> commoditizing their complements Feels like a modern euphemism for “subjugate their neighbors”.

No, it’s encouraging competition and cost-cutting in a part of the market they don’t control. This can be a reason for companies to support open source, for example.

Meanwhile, the companies running data centers will look for ways to support alternatives to Nvidia. That’s how they keep costs down.

It’s a good way to play companies off each other, when it works.

Re: NSF and Nvidia award Ai2 $152M to support building an open AI ecosystem

#23

Post by PeterStuer »

sounds wrote: post #7
hobofan wrote: post #3

If Nvidia were interested in "open" AI, they would spend time to collaborate with AMD, etc. to build an (updated) open alternative to CUDA. That's probably the most closed part of the whole stack right now.

Nvidia is interested in commoditizing their complements. It's a business strategy to decrease the power of OpenAI (for instance). Nvidia dreams of a world where there are lots of "open" alternatives to OpenAI, like there are lots of open game engines and lots open software in general. All buying closed Nvidia chips.

I thought they assumed AI hardware would become commoditized sooner rather than later, and their play was to sell complete vertically integrated AI solution stacks, mainly a software and services play?

Re: NSF and Nvidia award Ai2 $152M to support building an open AI ecosystem

#24

Post by [deleted] »

skybrian wrote: post #22
someone7x wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> commoditizing their complements Feels like a modern euphemism for “subjugate their neighbors”.

No, it’s encouraging competition and cost-cutting in a part of the market they don’t control. This can be a reason for companies to support open source, for example. Meanwhile, the companies running data centers will look for ways to support alternatives to Nvidia. That’s how they keep costs down. It’s a good way to play companies off each other, when it works.

[deleted]

Re: NSF and Nvidia award Ai2 $152M to support building an open AI ecosystem

#25

Post by jeffreysmith »

Not sure what's with the HN tone on this announcement. AI2 are really some of the best people around for creating truly open artifacts for the whole ecosystem. Their work on OLMo and Molmo is some of the most transparent and educational material you can find on model building. This is just great news for everyone.

Re: NSF and Nvidia award Ai2 $152M to support building an open AI ecosystem

#26

Post by sounds »

amelius wrote: post #18
sounds wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nvidia is interested in commoditizing their complements. It's a business strategy to decrease the power of OpenAI (for instance). Nvidia dreams of a world where there are lots of "open" alternatives to OpenAI, like there are lots of open game engines and lots open software in general. All buying closed Nvidia chips.

But AI depends on a small number of tensor operators, primitives which can be relatively easily implemented by competitors, so compute is very close to being a commodity when it comes to AI. A company like Cerebras (founded in 2015) proves that this is true. The moat is not in computer architecture. I'd say the real moat is in semiconductor fabrication.

Have you ever tried to run a model from huggingface on an AMD GPU?

Semiconductor fabrication is a high risk business.

Nvidia invested heavily in CUDA and out-competed AMD (and Intel). They are working hard to keep their edge in developer mindshare, while chasing hardware profits at the same time.

Re: NSF and Nvidia award Ai2 $152M to support building an open AI ecosystem

#27

Post by sim7c00 »

hobofan wrote: post #3

If Nvidia were interested in "open" AI, they would spend time to collaborate with AMD, etc. to build an (updated) open alternative to CUDA. That's probably the most closed part of the whole stack right now.

you are not wrong. open up cuda would be a a real power move. i think ppl would mind a some of their other crap practices a lot less.

Re: NSF and Nvidia award Ai2 $152M to support building an open AI ecosystem

#30

Post by arthurcolle »

grim_io wrote: post #10
arthurcolle wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is OpenAI a threat to Nvidia? They are still highly dependent on those GPUs

Google shows that Nvidia is not necessary. How long until more follow?

I agree in principle but you can't just yolo fab TPUs and leapfrog google
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