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DeepSeek makes the V4 Pro price discount permanent

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Re: DeepSeek makes the V4 Pro price discount permanent

#321

Post by pphysch »

estearum wrote: post #286
Petersipoi wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm quite sure that the American models have been fine-tuned for certain leanings and world views

Right, but they're ones that are more concordant with the leanings and world views of the people and businesses that frequent this forum. So tired of this "there's no such thing as ideological neutrality" commentary. We get it. Move on. Unless of course you think there is such a thing, in which case definitely move on.

Western education and popular culture reinforces a strong sense of ideological exceptionalism, so I frankly don't see the problem with having it spelled out now and then. The "we" that "gets it" is smaller than you think, as least as far as USA is concerned.

Re: DeepSeek makes the V4 Pro price discount permanent

#322

Post by skybrian »

syntaxing wrote: post #311

It’s wild. Regardless of Deepseek direct pricing, on Openrouter itself, the pricing for Pro is comparable to Haiku. Flash is even cheaper. You get Opus 4.5 and better than Sonnet 4.6 performance.

It can't see images so it doesn't do everything Sonnet will do. Still a good deal though.

Re: DeepSeek makes the V4 Pro price discount permanent

#323

Post by [deleted] »

itishappy wrote: post #319
estearum wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, but they're ones that are more concordant with the leanings and world views of the people and businesses that frequent this forum. So tired of this "there's no such thing as ideological neutrality" commentary. We get it. Move on. Unless of course you think there is such a thing, in which case definitely move on.

Which particular world views and leanings? Mine are likely quite different than yours. How does this site feel about "Woke AI" for instance? Remember, no neutrality please. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/07/prev...

[deleted]

Re: DeepSeek makes the V4 Pro price discount permanent

#324

Post by chrisweekly »

syntaxing wrote: post #311

It’s wild. Regardless of Deepseek direct pricing, on Openrouter itself, the pricing for Pro is comparable to Haiku. Flash is even cheaper. You get Opus 4.5 and better than Sonnet 4.6 performance.

Could you please clarify exactly what you mean?

Re: DeepSeek makes the V4 Pro price discount permanent

#325

Post by skybrian »

revolvingthrow wrote: post #288

Amusing that just when the big three AI providers from US raise prices significantly, even for the mini models, you’ve got a Chinese model slashing their already-cheap offer by 75%. Not to mention you can run this model on your own hardware, although admittedly even the flash stretches the meaning of local for individual people.

My guess is that the popular US providers get a lot more traffic and are supply-limited. No point in lowering prices unless you can serve the traffic that will result.

Re: DeepSeek makes the V4 Pro price discount permanent

#326

Post by AngryData »

comrade1234 wrote: post #271

Reminds me of this parking ramp I used to use occasionally. I'd park for hours and when leaving the guy in the booth would tell me the charge and it would always be ridiculously low, like $0.50 or $1.00. Definitely not enough to pay for the guy to sit in the booth. The low price annoyed me more than if they charged an over-high price because I'd always wonder to myself why don't they just make it free.

Are you sure that is the extent of their business? Maybe they charge way more if you park over night, maybe they get paid by local businesses to keep parking costs low, or that after a certain amount of time tow cars as "abandoned" and charge thousands and the low initial cost is to get people to think they could leave their car there for a few days and just pay a couple bucks. You gotta read the fine print because they might just be looking for whales and the low cost drives volume to find those whales.

Re: DeepSeek makes the V4 Pro price discount permanent

#327

Post by aurareturn »

zrtac wrote: post #316
Nifty3929 wrote: post #306

China may be subsidizing this for now in a way that US companies can't or won't - but if they keep building power infrastructure and the US doesn't, then it will no longer require subsidy from them. It will simply be absolutely cheaper (including profit margin) to serve tokens in China. China is building for the future, while Western Democracies are afraid of the future, and of their own shadow.

That is the talking point of OpenAI and a16z's super PAC: https://www.wired.com/story/super-pac-backed-by-openai-and-p... "Build American AI, a nonprofit linked to a super PAC bankrolled by executives at OpenAI and Andreessen Horowitz, is funding a campaign to spread pro-AI messaging and stoke fears about China." In reality Xi has warned of AI bubbles. If China was really pushing it they'd be equal or ahead because s…

They wouldn’t be ahead because they can’t buy Nvidia compute racks anymore and they don’t have EUV machines.

Blackwell is 10-20x more efficient than H200. Vera Rubin is expected to be several times more efficient than Blackwell.

The US has way more compute installed in Gigawatts because China can’t get enough chips. https://epoch.ai/blog/trends-in-ai-supercomputers

I do wonder how most Chinese employees at OpenAI and Anthropic feel about their employer constantly spreading anti China propaganda to decrease competition. Perhaps money solves almost all things so they go along with it.

Re: DeepSeek makes the V4 Pro price discount permanent

#328

Post by toddmorey »

Nifty3929 wrote: post #306

China may be subsidizing this for now in a way that US companies can't or won't - but if they keep building power infrastructure and the US doesn't, then it will no longer require subsidy from them. It will simply be absolutely cheaper (including profit margin) to serve tokens in China. China is building for the future, while Western Democracies are afraid of the future, and of their own shadow.

It feels like the US for years has operated under the assumption that homeostasis for the global economy would always be “designed in California, assembled in China.”

Like there was something in the American DNA that was lacking in China and innovation would always need to happen here.

But China it seems doesn’t need the US to produce great cars, devices, robotics, or AI. We absolutely need China to help us build all of the above.

Re: DeepSeek makes the V4 Pro price discount permanent

#329

Post by estearum »

itishappy wrote: post #319
estearum wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, but they're ones that are more concordant with the leanings and world views of the people and businesses that frequent this forum. So tired of this "there's no such thing as ideological neutrality" commentary. We get it. Move on. Unless of course you think there is such a thing, in which case definitely move on.

Which particular world views and leanings? Mine are likely quite different than yours. How does this site feel about "Woke AI" for instance? Remember, no neutrality please. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/07/prev...

Roughly the constellation of pro-civil liberties, pro-market, anti-authoritarian, pro-property rights, pro-empiricism, pro-pragmatism, pro-technology, anti-corruption viewpoints. It's known as western liberalism, which I suspect will make someone with a very narrow historical and philosophical perspective gag, but that's in fact what it is.

Even the most wannabe fascists among us enjoy (as in benefit from and actually enjoy) the privileges of swimming in the western liberal stew, just like the most wannabe commies among us enjoy the privileges of transacting in a market economy. Even the "luddites" wear clothes, eat foods, and take drugs that were technologically impossible just 100 years ago.

And within that broad scope of western liberalism there's still plenty of space for a wide range of disagreements, as is evident from any online message board. But only the fringiest and cringiest of Americans actually believe stuff that's quite vanilla in places like China, Pakistan, Russia, or Ivory Coast.

Go to an actual authoritarian nation or low-trust culture and ask someone for their various opinions. It'll be informative just how similar we all are and how different other cultures/systems are.

Narcissism of small differences.

Re: DeepSeek makes the V4 Pro price discount permanent

#330

Post by WarmWash »

nate8bit wrote: post #296
WarmWash wrote: post #287

[flagged]

The biggest problem we face in the west is thinking our institutions are somehow different. Be critical of the product all you want, but don't pretend the exact same thing isn't happening here.

[flagged]
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