Click bait headline. Nothing was proven about open source as the future. "To gain a foothold in Western markets, DeepSeek had to open-source its models." This is an opinion, not the only solution. DeepSeek could have remained proprietary just as easily. The bias of the author becomes clear at the end when he starts to promote his own open source company. Everyone has an agenda.
While it's clearly content marketing aimed at the hype of DeepSeek, it only mentions Lago in a single sentence.
It's just an article that is aimed to get you to hear about Lago, star their GitHub repository and eventually talk about the "open source" billing tool you heard about called Lago.
(I put Open Source in quotes because I think it's open source version is just Freeware with most features being Call To Action to a paid version. Fair disclosure I have https://github.com/billabear/billabear which is a competitor)
Eh, it's not disguised as anything, it's content marketing. Lago the API billing solution is not suggesting their product as a better alternative to ChatGPT.
To be fair, their ability to target HN is very good. I'm always impressed with their marketing. They put a good title that resonates with HN while the original title is something else for SEO.
Steelmanning the idea in general, this can be a form of commoditizing your complement: https://gwern.net/complement
Now, commercially, this may not make a lot of sense at the moment because no one is getting filthy rich on high-moat AI-using applications such that commoditizing the AI itself is a good idea commercially. I'm not sure anyone would even be confident enough to be the farm on the idea of someday being in that position.
However, if you analyze this from the perspective of world politics, where both explicit and implicit strategies are based on what tech companies have what tech and where it is located, it makes a lot of sense that if China is concerned that the US really is ahead in AI tech and that US financial and technical dominance is being driven by this dominance and being used to suck capital out of the countries that are behind, it makes all kinds of sense to commoditize the complements as basically a way of throwing the current game board up in the air and restarting again.
(One may also note that this analysis also says that just straight-up stealing the OpenAI tech and slightly AI-washing it before handing it out to everyone is also a logical move. I don't know enough to have any independent opinion as to whether that's where DeepSeek came from. I'm just saying that given the visible circumstances it is a strong strategic move for China at this point.)
Much of this purported strategy hinges on 'winning' at all cost by undermining the lead.
What is there to be won at the end? Does one party taking the reigns prevent the other from achieving similar capabilities? Is it necessary to win this race?
Or is this a cumulative, distributed effort that benefits all of us?
Whether it's true or not, world leader's ears are being filled with the claim that whoever wins the AI race wins everything, because AI will be able to win every other contest. They're being told it is winner-take-all like no contest has been winner-take-all before.
And they're all stupid enough to actually believe it? Why would a world leader listen to anyone in tech? They should ask an actual expert.
Edit: to be clear, what I mean is that to a first approximation technologists are charlatans and frauds. If you're looking for accurate information ask a scientist.
From a politician's perspective, scientists are like gold prospectors digging holes seemingly at random. $100 billion startups are what you get when the prospectors strike gold.
Why would you discuss gold with the wild-haired eccentric at the bottom of a hole, who has not yet found any gold, when you could talk to a gold mine owner who has - and who employs 1500 voters, and who like you wears a suit and tie?
> world leader's ears are being filled with the claim that whoever wins the AI race wins everything, because AI will be able to win every other contest
This describes a narrow slice of Silicon Valley numpties.
World leaders see an economic opportunity. Both to spend and to produce. No politician will turn down the opportunity to announce half a trillion dollars of spending.
> Or is this a cumulative, distributed effort that benefits all of us?
This. There are a few theories of geopolitics, one of the most successful being ones we be bunch under an umbrella called realism [1]. (The others are idealism [2] and liberalism [3]. Historia Civilis made a great three-part video series on these [4]. Note that Realpolitik [5], which relates to realism as its praxis, is not the same thing.)
One of the consequences of realism is balance of power theory, which “suggests that states may secure their survival by preventing any one state from gaining enough military power to dominate all others” [6].
What is to be won? Not being dominated; ideally: less war, since war is irrational. (See: Ukraine.) Does preventing others from dominating you prevent you from dominating others? No. Is it necessary to win? No. But that means ceding sovereignty and increasing the chances of violent conflict as geopolitical fault lines reälign.
A note on liberalism: it works. But it requires great power at its centre. America was that benevolent great power. Now it seems we don’t want to be. The power America has to hurt its allies, and the incentives to reap that advantage, is the consistent failure mode of liberal foreign-relation structures, since the days of the Delian League.
> Click bait headline. Nothing was proven about open source as the future.
Well sure but generally speaking proofs about reality are an oxymoron, so who on earth was taking the headline at face value to begin with? This is a rhetorical technique referred to as "hyperbole".
> Proofs about reality are not self contradicting.
Absolutely they are! Proofs are a deductive concept with no basis in reality. This is basic Hume. All we can work with is inductive and abductive reasoning, neither of which is sufficient for a proof.
> Proofs are a deductive concept with no basis in reality. This is basic Hume.
One, it's not. Two, you're trying to use Hume to prove a statement that refutes itself. The claim that your can prove proofs oxymoronic is itself an oxymoron.
Hume's critique of causation, moreover, has been amply supplanted since the 18th century. (Similar to Newton. In parts, it's been buttressed. In others, surpassed.)
> All we can work with is inductive and abductive reasoning, neither of which is sufficient for a proof
Mathematically false [1]. (And related to famous Gedankenexperiments, which prompted real science.)
Of course, this whole thread is a farce: you're purposefully confusing mathematial proofs with the colloquial "proof."
You’re rejecting mathematics, empiricism and reality as a foundation for defining proofs and thus truth. At that point, we’re in a Cartesian universe of 1 = 1.
I'm not sure it's planned or not. Finally, Chinese are generally proud of 4 great inventions. one of compass, another one of gonpower. Despite this, I still can't understand why they didn't think of starting geographical exploration and colonization. So I don't know what kind of agenda they have. But I do know one thing: except for China and the US, no one cares who the product comes from. If it's cheap or free, they use it, and no one cares. No one apologizes to the US for losing monopolies.
> can't understand why they didn't think of starting geographical exploration and colonization
They did. Just as a land power. Modern China includes conquered territory of the Mongolians, Turkics and Tibeto-Burmans, among others [1].
(The proximate answer is the Ming-Qing transition [2] overlapped with the Age of Discocery [3].)
> except for China and the US, no one cares who the product comes from
This is breathtakingly wrong, as a simple perusal of every single country's trade restrictions would show. (Even if you're talking about the population versus policy, show me a market where no premium is paid for luxury products imported from such and such distant land.)
> I still can't understand why they didn't think of starting geographical exploration and colonization
maybe it's offtopic, but that's what I'm good at, so I'll anwser this
First, ancient China was a feudal centralized dynasty that centered its interests on land and population, unlike commercial company-based regimes such as Britain and the Netherlands. This meant that, in the eyes of the Chinese imperial government, the East India Company was a threat rather than a cooperative partner.
Another reason is that ancient China was a typical land-based power, surrounded by various forces. It could only maintain its sphere of influence through annexation and the tributary system, without the ability to expand further. (Genghis Khan was the only exception—he carried out invasions but never truly established effective rule.)
However, ancient China did, to some extent, "colonize" certain Southeast Asian islands. But this was not institutionalized colonization; rather, it was a form of population migration. The central government had no control over these Chinese people venturing into the seas, which is why it repeatedly tried to prevent maritime expansion.
btw, in case someone said about xinjiang and tibet, you'll see he don't understand history outside the west, base on what i said, you can see it was annexation but not colonization
Only european powers had the urge for colonization, no other civilization in Americas, Africa or Asia really ever want to colonize, expand perhaps but not really colonize.
There was no economic need to do so, for most of last three millennium the economic center of the world has been India and China , they didn’t feel the need to go anywhere , the land is fertile with large local population and good weather to grow more than one crop with rich cultural heritage and throughput there is no payoff for undertaking risky voyages.
Everyone wanted to trade with them, colonial powers bombed ports forcing trading agreements or sold opium and other narcotics to get a foothold, funded expensive expeditions for new trade routes to India and colonized another continent instead , most of era of industrial revolution have been focusing on them as the market for European products not merely resource extraction.
Similarly given the people resources both regions had, there was no need for slavery that is also a european/Mediterranean thing primairly .
Not saying workers were or are treated well or there was great value for human rights in India or China, just that they need to go and find slaves from far off to do the work. They could find all the resources domestically.
> Only european powers had the urge for colonization, no other civilization in Americas, Africa or Asia really ever want to colonize, expand perhaps but not really colonize.
* Inca Empire: Relocated entire communities (the mitmaqkuna) into new provinces to cement imperial control—these were explicit colonies with an imposed administrative and cultural framework.
* Ancient Egypt: Occupied Nubia, built forts, stationed garrisons, and imposed Egyptian officials and religion on the local population.
* Mongol Empire: Installed governors across conquered regions stretching from Eastern Europe to East Asia, moved artisans and workers to bolster Mongol centers, and demanded tribute—hallmarks of a colonial system.
* Imperial China: Established commanderies in newly acquired territories (e.g., southern China), encouraged Han settlement, and superimposed its bureaucracy over local governance.
Historians do not consider mongol or Inca empire colonial . I would say mongols were probably polar opposite of colonizers they were extremely open and integrated extremely well into every region culture they occupied, there was no classical markers of colonization.
I specifically added Mediterranean later in my parent post to cover Egypt , Phoenician and Arab colonization which are considered as examples of pre modern era colonizing.
The hard separation of North Africa is sadly a modern view of the region that I have to do that explicitly, for most of history empires always had some land on both sides of the Mediterranean. This view is either promoted and exploited by far right in southern europe to justify many policies.
Your original claim was that "only European powers had the urge for colonization," but now you're citing Arab, Egyptian, and Phoenician examples. Do you see these as exceptions? If so, wouldn't that contradict your original claim? Or are you reconsidering your definition of colonialism—or using "European" in a broader sense (that somehow includes Arabs and Egyptians)?
Yes, the Chinese didn't like colonizing. They actually preferred complete extermination. The West has been much too kind in this regard.
Also slavery is a European thing? Cute! I think indeed we have been much too kind with foreigners, they somehow managed to thing that the laws, ethics and technology we gave them are just innate things found in nature, when in fact they are just European culture. Just like exploring the entire planet, cataloging its history and animals. We in fact had an extremely small amount of slaves compared to Arabs or Asians and to your lament we ended slavery. Somehow you still found ways to do it to this day though. Additionally the society with the most slaves in history has been Korea. And the time of us accepting millions of immigrants desperate to either live with us or copy us and then tell us how much greater their own societies are, will end soon. You are free to go and live there with your own people.
Genocides in Americas, Australia and elsewhere of first nation people notwithstanding i suppose
> laws, ethics and technology we gave them
Unasked and unwanted "civilizing" by European powers is what got us Congo Free State and dozens of other atrocities all under the name of "civilizing". It is not like rest of the world was living in trees with no laws and morality.
> Most slaves in history has been Korea
This is a controversial view of Korea, there is no consensus if nobi and the class system during the Joseon period (much less so in Goreyo period) was serfdom or slavery, that is not easy classification to make, given that they had many rights, many earned salary, nobi women in 1400s got 100 days maternity leave by law, a lot more than modern American women do today.
Even if we take assume they were all slaves, Korea was by no means the leading country by % of population, and also we have to consider nobi were largely ethnic Koreans, not foreigners explicitly captured to be slaves and the economy didn't run on continuous capture of foreign slaves
> us accepting millions of immigrants desperate to either live with us or copy us and then tell us how much greater their own societies are, will end soon. You are free to go and live there with your own people.
While there is a discourse to be had socio-economic policies in the west from repatriation of cultural artifacts, to climate change or geopolitics that can stabilize the global south and reduce immigration, at this point I have to stop engaging.
We are talking ancient history ? Not Japan post Meiji restoration trying to be copy and catch up to world powers after stagnating during the Tokugawa shogunate for centuries.
After the sengoku jidai[1] the failed imjin wars under Toyotomi Hideyoshi was the only serious attempt to expand to China and Korea, they of course failed and Japan faced inward till Meiji period as was typical of most of their history
Post Meiji restoration is hardly a fair comparison the Japanese believed that they have to be like other world (colonial) powers to be powerful.
[1]Unrelated note: one of my favorite periods in history.
But if we are, the Arab colonization of the Middle East + North Africa has to rank among the most dominant of all time, yes? Still apparent to this day.
Yes, Arab Phoenician and Egyptian empires all are classified as early colonizers and/or slavers. I added the qualifier European/Mediterranean hoping to signal i covered them as well, but that doesn't seem to be coming across.
Let me put another way- sub Saharan African, Chinese, southeast/far-east Asian, Indian, North/South American(first nations), Polynesian empires etc largely did not do empire building via colonization or slavery.
This is not to say they valued human life or did not commit atrocities, it just means that economic models that necessitated colonies for resource extraction or large markets to sell to, or foreign slaves for human labor never evolved there influenced to environmental, population and cultural factors so colonization is atypical response when the empires are built there.
We can see observe difference today in how say China deals with foreign investments, loans and other development initiatives compared to how western powers do. The deals tend to be primarily economic with willingness to work with existing regimes and less non-economic conditions attached and so on.
> the economic center of the world has been India and China , they didn’t feel the need to go anywhere
You're describing two modern states that encompass geographies that were constantly at internal turmoil. (Including as empires [1].) It's like asking why the Germans were late to the game in colonising: they're a land power and were in a constant state of internal turmoil.
"They had enough" flies in the face of human history and European colonialism itself.
I didn’t mean to say They had enough to mean they were satiated , it was supposed to mean they had enough in their own regions to fight , win and enjoy over they didn’t need to go overseas to acquire riches .
Neither region is a utopia in history or today, simply there was enough land and people and other resources within, so they viewed their region to be the world, there was no economic impetus to colonize or enslave from far off places is my point .
Have you looked at the map of China in the past? Much of the West and North was only recently conquered in the same time period as Colonialism, and the South prior to that. Xinjiang literally means "New Frontier", and the ongoing tensions can be viewed as the continuation of such colonialism in modern times.
>Despite this, I still can't understand why they didn't think of starting geographical exploration and colonization
They literally had emperors who banned all overseas travel because it represented a threat to their own power: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haijin . China is the extremely large and extremely centralised, so the rulers' primary focus has always been on maintaining their own power. Fortunately the current government still allows private firms enough freedom that one was able to invent DeepSeek, however if the recent crackdown on financial firms had happened a few years earlier then the firm behind DeepSeek wouldn't have had the money to fund its creation.
His open source company is copyleft unlike DeepSeek, and the application domain is specifically designed such that no company would use his "open source" product.
OpenAI invested in non-open foundation models and DeepSeek came and (approximately) dethroned them. I don't agree with the conclusion of the article, but the statement "open-sourcing a model lets another company dethrone you" is also not great. I'd stand behind "in the world of AI in 2024/2025, regardless of whether the model is open or not, someone is likely to come and dethrone you in a snap".
> DeepSeek came and (approximately) dethroned them
The parenthetical should really be "(temporarily, approximately)". I wouldn't count OpenAI out until we see how o3 compares, assuming they actually make it available this week.
Maybe "dethrone" isn't the right word, but if a startup on the other side of the world, without the best hardware, can create something comparable and cheaper to build/run just four months after the release of the top company's flagship model: I don't understand the OpenAI business model.
