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Please don't conflate a volunteer effort with no expected economic gain with a very well funded company (or fleet of companies). With the CCP's highly successf

Please don't conflate a volunteer effort with no expected economic gain with a very well funded company (or fleet of companies). With the CCP's highly successful track record with subsuming other markets, Occam's razor applies to why they're doing this.

Der_Einzige 2mo ago
[flagged]
- jchw 2mo ago
  Well of course nobody believes that, there are a large number of great Chinese open source projects, and plenty of great Chinese contributors to open source projects. I have zero doubts that Chinese people are at least equally as capable of embracing open source as anyone else. It would be strange to suggest otherwise. That said, though, I do have trouble believing the long-term story for open weights, anywhere. We do not need an evil government for open weight to "make sense", but I do think we need some government involvement for open weight to make sense in the long run. Otherwise, it's not 100% clear how they could be sustainable, and I don't think massive companies really can be trusted to just be philanthropic with no incentives indefinitely (or really, much at all to begin with.) Chinese models being open weight does help them gain some Western mindshare, whereas for obvious reasons Americans would be very suspicious of running their source code and prompts through Chinese providers. (And I think that's justified, I just also think that American providers aren't really that much better in the long run, and you should prefer to not have to go through any provider for true privacy.)
  - nylonstrung 2mo ago
    The CCP encourages open source contributions from companies, you can see this in how much Alibaba open sources across their entire stack Chinese tech leans much more heavily towards build vs. buy than the SaaS dominated West (where programmers are more expensive) so the positive externalities on their tech industry are more pronounced
    - jchw 2mo ago
      Sure, when it comes to the big corporations I don't deny CCP's influence on their strategy. Hell, in some cases, it's easy to root for their strategy, because sometimes our tech industry sucks. Don't have to love them to occasionally agree with them. But, in terms of individuals, of course, we're really not so different.
- KeplerBoy 2mo ago
  Sir, this is a multi-billion dollar operation. There have to be some incentives.
  - bigyabai 2mo ago
    You could argue that Linux is a trillion-dollar project, it doesn't shift the goalposts.
    - polyomino 2mo ago
      Linux is a huge project and is not really comparable to Debian
      - esseph 2mo ago
        This is an interesting statement that I found myself reading from two different interpretations of what you meant, and I find both possibilities to be equally true depending on your POV.
    - abalashov 2mo ago
      Yeah, but the trillion dollars are not concentrated in the Linux kernel project, but instead distributed all over the planet. That's not how the AI lab economy works.
  - m000 2mo ago
    [flagged]
    - liamwire 2mo ago
      I like the comparison, but I'm not sure it holds. What did it cost him to develop beyond intangibles such as his time and money forgone? Because the latter especially is not equivalent to upfront capex and opex costs that preempt any ability to be charitable. Genuinely asking, but I'd be hard pressed to think it's even within the same magnitude.
shimman 2mo ago
IDK how this doesn't apply to American tech corporations too? Or is it only scary when America corporations face actual competition nowadays where they can't rely on the US government to bomb/sanction competitors?
watwut 2mo ago
1.) Majority of debian contributions are from people paid for it. 2.) It is scary because they do what sillicon valley did for decades? While it bragged about disruption being the goal?
cma 2mo ago
It could be as simple as do open releases and publication at first to help recruit talent who want that or who want to make a name for themselves. learned from the likes of... OpenAI, Google, Meta, Emad
- seanmcdirmid 2mo ago
  There must be some Alibaba posters who could clarify this. I think it’s like how Amazon pushed AWS, alibaba is hoping create a similar ecosystem. I wouldn’t conflate them with the CPC or other more niche players like deepseek.
windsignaling 2mo ago
There is clearly an anti-China bias here. Show me comments demonstrating the same level of distrust against Google for open-sourcing projects like Tensorflow, Kubernetes, Flutter, Chromium, etc.
- snowpid 2mo ago
  Chromium and Kubernetes do have their business function. Tensorflow had a business function but it failed. So Google is not a great counter example.
  - windsignaling 2mo ago
    AI doesn't have a business function...?
- akoboldfrying 2mo ago
  I'll supply such a comment: Any software open sourced by any for-profit company, including Google, is a calculated move ultimately intended to increase their bottom line, and it's naive to think otherwise.
  - jcelerier 2mo ago
    Isn't it borderline illegal for publicly traded companies to not try to maximize profit? "interest of the company" in theory but in practice
    - postepowanieadm 2mo ago
      Think about the shareholders!
    - deaux 2mo ago
      No, it is not. This is a common misconception that the large companies are very happy about. 1. The century-old Ford decision wasn't about this. It was about him refusing to pay dividends to shareholders he was feuding with. I.e. dominant shareholder using his control to starve minority shareholders of returns. The court still let him keep spending huge sums on factories and price cuts that didn't clearly maximize profits. 2. Even if the case was about profit maximization (it wasn't), the judgment was a Michigan state decision. It doesn't have force outside of it. 3. US business law is in practice actually the opposite. A business can do pretty much whatever it wants. This is fundamental. 4. Even if it were illegal (it's not), anything can reasonably be framed as being in the long-term interest of the company, including donating to causes, raising employee wages and so on. Courts never question this. Just imagine this was a thing. It's completely untenable for this reason. Who is a court to judge that something isn't in the longterm interest of shareholders unless it's literally spending all the company money on yachts for personal use? 5. No company has ever been prosecuted for this, obviously, because it's not a thing that exists. The closest you can get is that there's a potential duty to seek the best price if a company must be sold or broken up. But that's a very specific situation. It's 100% a myth. Feel free to copy this and spread it when you see someone saying this.

Der_Einzige 2mo ago

[flagged]

jchw 2mo ago
Well of course nobody believes that, there are a large number of great Chinese open source projects, and plenty of great Chinese contributors to open source projects. I have zero doubts that Chinese people are at least equally as capable of embracing open source as anyone else. It would be strange to suggest otherwise. That said, though, I do have trouble believing the long-term story for open weights, anywhere. We do not need an evil government for open weight to "make sense", but I do think we need some government involvement for open weight to make sense in the long run. Otherwise, it's not 100% clear how they could be sustainable, and I don't think massive companies really can be trusted to just be philanthropic with no incentives indefinitely (or really, much at all to begin with.) Chinese models being open weight does help them gain some Western mindshare, whereas for obvious reasons Americans would be very suspicious of running their source code and prompts through Chinese providers. (And I think that's justified, I just also think that American providers aren't really that much better in the long run, and you should prefer to not have to go through any provider for true privacy.)
- nylonstrung 2mo ago
  The CCP encourages open source contributions from companies, you can see this in how much Alibaba open sources across their entire stack Chinese tech leans much more heavily towards build vs. buy than the SaaS dominated West (where programmers are more expensive) so the positive externalities on their tech industry are more pronounced
  - jchw 2mo ago
    Sure, when it comes to the big corporations I don't deny CCP's influence on their strategy. Hell, in some cases, it's easy to root for their strategy, because sometimes our tech industry sucks. Don't have to love them to occasionally agree with them. But, in terms of individuals, of course, we're really not so different.
KeplerBoy 2mo ago
Sir, this is a multi-billion dollar operation. There have to be some incentives.
- bigyabai 2mo ago
  You could argue that Linux is a trillion-dollar project, it doesn't shift the goalposts.
  - polyomino 2mo ago
    Linux is a huge project and is not really comparable to Debian
    - esseph 2mo ago
      This is an interesting statement that I found myself reading from two different interpretations of what you meant, and I find both possibilities to be equally true depending on your POV.
  - abalashov 2mo ago
    Yeah, but the trillion dollars are not concentrated in the Linux kernel project, but instead distributed all over the planet. That's not how the AI lab economy works.
- m000 2mo ago
  [flagged]
  - liamwire 2mo ago
    I like the comparison, but I'm not sure it holds. What did it cost him to develop beyond intangibles such as his time and money forgone? Because the latter especially is not equivalent to upfront capex and opex costs that preempt any ability to be charitable. Genuinely asking, but I'd be hard pressed to think it's even within the same magnitude.

shimman 2mo ago

IDK how this doesn't apply to American tech corporations too? Or is it only scary when America corporations face actual competition nowadays where they can't rely on the US government to bomb/sanction competitors?

watwut 2mo ago

1.) Majority of debian contributions are from people paid for it. 2.) It is scary because they do what sillicon valley did for decades? While it bragged about disruption being the goal?

cma 2mo ago

It could be as simple as do open releases and publication at first to help recruit talent who want that or who want to make a name for themselves. learned from the likes of... OpenAI, Google, Meta, Emad

seanmcdirmid 2mo ago
There must be some Alibaba posters who could clarify this. I think it’s like how Amazon pushed AWS, alibaba is hoping create a similar ecosystem. I wouldn’t conflate them with the CPC or other more niche players like deepseek.

windsignaling 2mo ago

There is clearly an anti-China bias here. Show me comments demonstrating the same level of distrust against Google for open-sourcing projects like Tensorflow, Kubernetes, Flutter, Chromium, etc.

snowpid 2mo ago
Chromium and Kubernetes do have their business function. Tensorflow had a business function but it failed. So Google is not a great counter example.
- windsignaling 2mo ago
  AI doesn't have a business function...?
akoboldfrying 2mo ago
I'll supply such a comment: Any software open sourced by any for-profit company, including Google, is a calculated move ultimately intended to increase their bottom line, and it's naive to think otherwise.
- jcelerier 2mo ago
  Isn't it borderline illegal for publicly traded companies to not try to maximize profit? "interest of the company" in theory but in practice
  - postepowanieadm 2mo ago
    Think about the shareholders!
  - deaux 2mo ago
    No, it is not. This is a common misconception that the large companies are very happy about. 1. The century-old Ford decision wasn't about this. It was about him refusing to pay dividends to shareholders he was feuding with. I.e. dominant shareholder using his control to starve minority shareholders of returns. The court still let him keep spending huge sums on factories and price cuts that didn't clearly maximize profits. 2. Even if the case was about profit maximization (it wasn't), the judgment was a Michigan state decision. It doesn't have force outside of it. 3. US business law is in practice actually the opposite. A business can do pretty much whatever it wants. This is fundamental. 4. Even if it were illegal (it's not), anything can reasonably be framed as being in the long-term interest of the company, including donating to causes, raising employee wages and so on. Courts never question this. Just imagine this was a thing. It's completely untenable for this reason. Who is a court to judge that something isn't in the longterm interest of shareholders unless it's literally spending all the company money on yachts for personal use? 5. No company has ever been prosecuted for this, obviously, because it's not a thing that exists. The closest you can get is that there's a potential duty to seek the best price if a company must be sold or broken up. But that's a very specific situation. It's 100% a myth. Feel free to copy this and spread it when you see someone saying this.