> It is absolutely impressive; these types of models are going to change the world in one form or another.

> But at least for the moment I don’t know how to work with it for actual software engineering.

These two statements seem contradictory.

It’s not contradictory if it can change the world without being something software engineers specifically can work with.

Pathetic lack of self-respect.

What would you do in their situation?

Don’t hate the player.

I have mad respect for people who can actually throw away a shit ton of financial security for themselves and their families for something they believe in. It’s rare for a reason. Everyone has a price.

If you can get financial security without selling your soul, fewer people would do that, across every industry where selling your soul for security is possible.

You can absolutely hate the player. You can even hate yourself if you know you’d make the same choice.

We’re all humans, we have agency. We’re not some pachinko ball bouncing through life.

I feel people who sell their souls to be in finance or work as corporate attorneys for bad companies deserve criticism, but people who sell their souls to work for an enterprise they themselves believe is at the very least going to destroy civilization absolutely are pathetic and evil.

Correct, it's not that. It's worse.

If I wasn't talking to you and you were just listening to me in public, yes.

How can you make a computer or smartphone that's distinct from the competition? These are commodity appliances built to a price point with some graphic design slapped on top to pretty it up.

The Samsung foldables are an entirely different size and aspect ratio; how is the Duo a copy of something entirely different?

The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8, Xiaomi 18 Fold and Huawei Pura X Max all have pretty similar fold aspect ratios to the Duo?

Not sure 'copying' is a clarifying explanation of what is happening though.

Apple allegedly uses Samsung screens in the Duo so they ought to be the exact same.

Apple isn't really an innovator, at least in the sense of delivering "new" things. Their success is in assessing a market and refining products for consumer adoption.

Mac wasn't the first personal computer but it was well-suited for the mass market, not just "computer people". iPod wasn't the first mp3 player but the first that was easy for regular folks to use. iPhone wasn't the first smartphone, but the first one that people actually wanted.

There's a pattern here.

Yeah the pattern is "regular folks" enjoy reality tv too. Because they don't enjoy thinking. It's obviously trash but there's a market.

I feel the same way about Apple. It's target market is uninformed users. Never purchased anything from them.

Don't even get me started on the closed ecosystem. Admittedly Google/android has been closing in on that front but the initial intentions were good.

There is quite a leap from entertainment viewing choices to device gadget selection. It seems like a straw man to beat down and argue. My question is why? Why attached identity behind gadget choice? It is all marketing by large corporations in the end.

I think you're right, though you're talking about an old era, where the iPhone was truly revolutionary, but how do you think the Duo is different from the other folds now?

the first iPhone was years ahead of its time, but the first Apple foldable is arguably the exact same (if not inferior) to the competition, with the exception of the good user experience we're used to from Apple

It wasn't years ahead of its time. It was nice but the original iPhone was far behind its smartphone competitors in many respects. IIRC:

• No 3G! This made the whole "i" part of the iPhone mostly worthless when not connected to wifi. Other phones had 3G.

• No installable apps. Many argued about whether it was a smartphone at all.

• No copy/paste.

• No multi-tasking.

etc. Probably more I forgot. Its competitors had all of these.

Do you honestly think roads and the internet are similar? I don't think you've really thought that through.

Yeah, looking around at society today it's obvious the main problem is the government trying too hard and passing too much legislation.

I mean I do think regulatory capture is at least in part what's allowed corporations to conquer the web

Everything. It is what allows corporations to conquer everything.

Anti-competitive tactics aren’t in play at all?

> Why do everyone assume they are subsidized?

It's not an assumption when the companies hosting the models publicly announce that they're subsidizing costs.

Depends on whether the costs they have are inflated ten-fold due to hardware shortages.

Ignoring current state of shortages, the interesting part (for me at least) is how much a SOTA token costs on current hardware if you exclude the costs for paying for current TSMC shortage and without factoring in the cost of new datacenters being rushed and renting hardware from your competitors (who are also supply limited).

The "actual" cost is of course also relevant and interesting but it is another thing entirely.

Have they actually announced that they're charging less than the marginal cost of inference, or that the revenue they're taking in doesn't make up for the cost of training each newer and better model?

The former does not pass the smell test when there are random providers selling tokens for competitive open weight models.