Welcome to Replicate’s weekly bulletin! Each week, we’ll bring you updates on the latest open-source AI models, tools, and research. People are making cool stuff and we want to share it with you. Without further ado, here’s our hacker-in-residence deepfates with an unfiltered take on the week in AI.
Editor’s note
The big event this week was the release of Llama 3.1, Meta’s new generation of language models, including the 405 billion parameter model. This model is a peer to GPT-4, Claude 3, and Gemini 1.5, the big proprietary models from other labs.
But unlike those labs, Meta doesn’t claim to be building superintelligence, or even AGI. They think of AI as a system, and language models as one component. Mark Zuckerberg, in his letter accompanying the release, repeatedly uses the phrase “AI systems”. More than most people, he understands that software doesn’t exist in a vacuum. An “app” like Facebook or Instagram is actually a giant, interconnected set of social and technical systems. An “AI” will be like this too: not one giant end-to-end omnimodal intelligence, but a bunch of components working together.
Human intelligence is already a component in that system. Each one of us is a squishy cog in the vast machine of society. The systems look to us for guidance: Do you like this video? Would you buy this product? Does this picture contain a bus? They also inform us: Meeting in 10 minutes. Turn right at the next intersection. New message from Mom. We co-evolve with the systems we use.
