Here's a nice summary. Haven't read the book yet though it's on my list.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ghurtado","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:26:29.000Z","created_at_i":1788848789,"id":49606248,"options":[],"parent_id":49606080,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Ok, so once again South Park sounds completely deranged when they let reality do the writing.
I miss when "reality is stranger than fiction" was a cool phrase because it didn't happen all the time.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"vlyan","children":[{"author":"vintagedave","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:35:50.000Z","created_at_i":1788849350,"id":49606318,"options":[],"parent_id":49606254,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Other than investment, such as this news?
I know AI has more regulations here in the EU, but what I don't see clearly explained is what impact that has on pure research: creating new comparable models. So I'm suspicious that it's really impactful. On market deployment, maybe - that's where regulations lie. On internal company research?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"wongarsu","children":[{"author":"pembrook","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:49:29.000Z","created_at_i":1788853769,"id":49606949,"options":[],"parent_id":49606356,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"On its own, all regulations usually look reasonable.
It\u2019s when you stack over 100,000 regulations (this is literally the number the EU has created) on top of each other and then combine them with country level regs that you create a system that\u2019s impossible to grow in.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:41:45.000Z","created_at_i":1788849705,"id":49606356,"options":[],"parent_id":49606254,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Most things in the EU AI Act are entirely reasonable. On its own it's a pretty sensible piece of legislation.
But the US and China are incredibly lenient on enforcing even existing laws against their AI companies. In the US the standard seems to be "no instructions to make bombs or drugs, and the ability to make porn of living people has to be restricted to paid users". Laws around cyber security and copyright that used to be heavily enforced are seemingly suspended for AI companies, or settled out of court. No company that tries to actually follow the law can compete with that","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"__alexs","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:46:25.000Z","created_at_i":1788849985,"id":49606399,"options":[],"parent_id":49606254,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Regulation might have something to do with it but your example doesn't show that imo.
Multiple US labs were taken to court over copyright infringment for their training data. Mistral did the same data mining, but actually the copyright situation is weaker here so it's harder to build a case against them.
I think the capital situation in EU is just worse. A lot of is tied up in more conservative businesses that are reluctant to bet the house on some shiny new thing.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:27:29.000Z","created_at_i":1788848849,"id":49606254,"options":[],"parent_id":49606080,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"to be fair, there is no plausible explanation for Mistral's fall into irrelevance other than having to deal with regulatory burden. US and CN labs get to feed their models all the data in the world while Mistral has to comply with Let's-Smother-The-AI-Baby-In-The-Crib-To-Maybe-Prevent-It-From-Maybe-Becoming-A-Criminal Act that EU nepo babies had expedited as soon as AI became the current thing.
Mistral had open-weights SOTA when Chinese labs had no noteworthy LLMs at all, and now even its closed-weights offerings are behind half a hundred Chinese models -- most of them from labs with way less funding -- despite having had unhindered access to Nvidia hardware all this time.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Hikikomori","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:56:02.000Z","created_at_i":1788854162,"id":49607004,"options":[],"parent_id":49606080,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Their brains were broken because the government still has the ability to say no to them in some cases.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"BoredomIsFun","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:18:53.000Z","created_at_i":1788859133,"id":49607769,"options":[],"parent_id":49606080,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> seen as the inhibitors of progress
I become the government institution, the inhibitor of progress.
What a load of delusion.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:06:36.000Z","created_at_i":1788847596,"id":49606080,"options":[],"parent_id":49606029,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"If you follow the ideology of the Silicon Valley billionaire types, based around Ayn Rand (eg \u201cAtlas Shrugged\u201d) and Curtis Yarvin, as well as what Thiel himself has said over the years, the Antichrist is governmental institutions, seen as the inhibitors of progress. I am not joking btw.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"luplex","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:01:00.000Z","created_at_i":1788854460,"id":49607058,"options":[],"parent_id":49606029,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"No, Thiel is talking about the UN and global minimum taxes when he talks about the Antichrist.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T05:59:30.000Z","created_at_i":1788847170,"id":49606029,"options":[],"parent_id":49605971,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Is that who Thiel is talking about? I thought it was just a bible thing.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Frieren","children":[{"author":"shrubby","children":[{"author":"maxrev17","children":[{"author":"skeledrew","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:20:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788855635,"id":49607248,"options":[],"parent_id":49606110,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It's default behavior due to scarcity. Remove that permanently and there's no longer incentive to be greedy.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:11:29.000Z","created_at_i":1788847889,"id":49606110,"options":[],"parent_id":49606083,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yeah it\u2019s \u2019more more more\u2019. Seems a very nature based behaviour. We need a restraint or predator to slow us off!","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Frieren","children":[{"author":"shrubby","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:57:48.000Z","created_at_i":1788854268,"id":49607026,"options":[],"parent_id":49606508,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yup. I tried to say that conventional taxation is not enough. As the power is hidden in Panama bank accounts we need to figure out means beyond taxation to neutralize it as it being used to obliterate the future.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:58:07.000Z","created_at_i":1788850687,"id":49606508,"options":[],"parent_id":49606083,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Taxation will not solve this before the global society collapses
Taxation can and must solve it before "society collapses". And many people are working to solve the problem. It is difficult and requires effort but nothing that has not been done before. We got rid of king (by the will of god) in the past so techno-power-hungry cringey businessmen should be easier.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:07:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788847626,"id":49606083,"options":[],"parent_id":49606041,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The power is in the hands of a few people obsessed or possessed. Gambling addiction, narcissism, power hunger.
Taxation will not solve this before the global society collapses so the question is whether we figure out a way to level the power.
This is not evil, but a trait of human nature of corruption or addiction to power.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ekianjo","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:02:52.000Z","created_at_i":1788850972,"id":49606552,"options":[],"parent_id":49606041,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> the will of the people.
there is so such thing.
if there is it sure is very flexible and forgetful","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:00:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788847235,"id":49606041,"options":[],"parent_id":49605971,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"This is why wealth should be less concentrated. A few people has their hands in all businesses and that will end badly.
Taxation is not just about paying for the costs of the country, it is also about making sure that nobody has enough power to subjugate the will of the people. Monopolies, billionaires, the accumulation of such power is making the average citizen powerless. And you can feel it.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T05:51:48.000Z","created_at_i":1788846708,"id":49605971,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Existing investors a16z
I don't trust anything the antichrist invests in","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"0x20cowboy","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:03:39.000Z","created_at_i":1788847419,"id":49606059,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Tr\u00e8s bien! C\u2019est parti!","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"steinvakt2","children":[{"author":"danmaz74","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:16:47.000Z","created_at_i":1788848207,"id":49606155,"options":[],"parent_id":49606117,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"At this stage it's not about how much it's worth, but how much investment is required to reach their goals.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"hobofan","children":[{"author":"steinvakt2","children":[{"author":"nicce","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:28:12.000Z","created_at_i":1788848892,"id":49606260,"options":[],"parent_id":49606188,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Better to buy GPUs and RAM with current rate","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:20:52.000Z","created_at_i":1788848452,"id":49606188,"options":[],"parent_id":49606159,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"If not, I\u2019m buying stocks","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:17:05.000Z","created_at_i":1788848225,"id":49606159,"options":[],"parent_id":49606117,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Are they, though? I would say, let's find out when the IPO settles, but then again the market also sustains a incredibly crazy valuation for Tesla.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"shikck200","children":[{"author":"skeledrew","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:31:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788856280,"id":49607353,"options":[],"parent_id":49606231,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I think the Pro and other subs allow them to save big on ads (Claude Code use is required and it pushes their ads) and allow easy access to free data (CC occasionally solicits feedback and session sharing, which I'm pretty sure some users oblige). Also CC does massive prompt caching tailored to work in lockstep with their platform. With all that and who knows what else, I'd say it balances over time.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:25:08.000Z","created_at_i":1788848708,"id":49606231,"options":[],"parent_id":49606117,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Nah. They are not, everyone is losing money, and just staying alive from gov subsidies. A claude PRO license is 20 usd/month, and for it to be profitable it should be somewhere around 200-300/month.
The bubble is going to burst soon.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Daunk","children":[{"author":"bpodgursky","children":[{"author":"Systemerror7A69","children":[{"author":"benjaminwootton","children":[{"author":"disgruntledphd2","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:57:38.000Z","created_at_i":1788875858,"id":49610433,"options":[],"parent_id":49606496,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"You probably shouldn't believe leaks when a company has a financial incentive to appear profitable (particularly when attempting to IPO).","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:56:40.000Z","created_at_i":1788850600,"id":49606496,"options":[],"parent_id":49606374,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It\u2019s thought to be because it\u2019s a private company but it\u2019s very well cited.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:44:14.000Z","created_at_i":1788849854,"id":49606374,"options":[],"parent_id":49606273,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"And my wallet is thought to contain a billion dollars, so long as I don't open it.
Seriously "thought to be" is such a baseless statement. Thought to be by whom? And on what basis?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"nesk_","children":[{"author":"tristanj","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:01:07.000Z","created_at_i":1788854467,"id":49607061,"options":[],"parent_id":49606589,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Anthropic is currently in an IPO quiet period and cannot publish such information.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:08:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788851300,"id":49606589,"options":[],"parent_id":49606273,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"If they were cash flow positive they would tell it to everyone, be sure of that.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"eloisant","children":[{"author":"adventured","children":[{"author":"phtrivier","children":[{"author":"r4rf","children":[{"author":"mirekrusin","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:23:38.000Z","created_at_i":1788873818,"id":49610020,"options":[],"parent_id":49609395,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Same as our OpenAI friends, who founded a non-profit because one company (Google) holding AGI would be dangerous for humanity. Turns out it's only dangerous when it's somebody else's company. When it's yours, it changes things slightly.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"signatoremo","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:25:18.000Z","created_at_i":1788888318,"id":49613450,"options":[],"parent_id":49609395,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Eh. You\u2019d have to clarify that. Google get started because other search engines at the time sucked. I had a soft spot for Ask Jeeves, but it was clear Google was better.
Advertising is the monetizing strategy from early on. AdWords came to be in 2000. Nothing fuzzy about that.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:25:49.000Z","created_at_i":1788870349,"id":49609395,"options":[],"parent_id":49608921,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Funny thing is, they stated their reason for existence was because ad-based revenue models would corrupt search quality. Funny that!","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:40:44.000Z","created_at_i":1788867644,"id":49608921,"options":[],"parent_id":49608250,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Was google already selling ads in 1999 ? Because before that, NO, they did not have a viable long term economic model.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:16:09.000Z","created_at_i":1788862569,"id":49608250,"options":[],"parent_id":49606698,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Billions of long-term users for the most important technology in human history isn't a premise of fake cash in a circular economy.
You might as well pretend there's no money in search or social media.
1999. That Google, it has no serious business model, it'll never make real money. Hello GoTo.
2006. That Facebook, it has no serious business model, it'll never make real money.
One more: 2020. That Uber, I could clone an MVP and kill them over the weekend if I really wanted to. That's a side project at best. They're bleeding to death anyway, losing money hand over fist, they'll never make it. They have no moat at all.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:21:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788852093,"id":49606698,"options":[],"parent_id":49606273,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"it's fake cash flow based on circular economy","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:30:50.000Z","created_at_i":1788849050,"id":49606273,"options":[],"parent_id":49606232,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Anthropic is thought to be cash flow positive now.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:25:16.000Z","created_at_i":1788848716,"id":49606232,"options":[],"parent_id":49606117,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"*losing trillions","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:12:44.000Z","created_at_i":1788847964,"id":49606117,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"That\u2019s great, but meanwhile American competitors are worth\u2026 trillions?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"keel-control","children":[{"author":"ludvigk","children":[{"author":"cbg0","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:49:13.000Z","created_at_i":1788850153,"id":49606426,"options":[],"parent_id":49606182,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Blocking EU from those services would crash the valuation of US AI companies, so I'm not expecting it to happen.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"0xDEAFBEAD","children":[{"author":"clarionbell","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:18:25.000Z","created_at_i":1788859105,"id":49607763,"options":[],"parent_id":49606428,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"If EU were to "leverage" ASML, and that would require rather unlikely approval of Netherlands, it wouldn't end very well.
Already shipped machines can not be taken back, nor can they be stopped. Sure, you can cut the support, and buildup of new fabs will be stalled. But the other side, Chinese or USA, has many more levers to pull. Raw materials, energy (LNG), was majority of consumer goods, solar panels, batteries, semiconductors. EU doesn't mine or make most of them, and isn't nowhere close to even starting, instead, industrial base is already shrinking.
Even worse, ASML may dominate EUV, but other suppliers do very well in DUV. The moment ASML becomes unreliable, all of them will get infusion of money, as they become national security issue.
What about ASML subsidiaries in USA, like Cymer and ASML Wilton, will they take the bullet for the parent? Or will they become part of new competitor, with all the knowhow.
And China has already set domestic capacities in this area as a national priority.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:49:26.000Z","created_at_i":1788850166,"id":49606428,"options":[],"parent_id":49606182,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"OpenAI also indirectly depends on ASML, but sadly Europe seems too cowardly to leverage this dependency at the moment.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"slopinthebag","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:37:14.000Z","created_at_i":1788853034,"id":49606844,"options":[],"parent_id":49606182,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"You'd still have access to the Chinese models though right? Even if you want to argue they aren't truly SOTA they're still pretty dang good.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:20:03.000Z","created_at_i":1788848403,"id":49606182,"options":[],"parent_id":49606143,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Same here. And I doubt 3B EUR will do anything (remember the >$100B investment round that OpenAI got?)
In the EU it seems we are very much at risk of being cut off from frontier AI if the US government should decide to do so.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"loehnsberg","children":[{"author":"aurareturn","children":[{"author":"catdog","children":[{"author":"vineyardmike","children":[{"author":"mastermage","children":[{"author":"slopinthebag","children":[{"author":"mastermage","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-10T07:06:41.000Z","created_at_i":1789024001,"id":49639535,"options":[],"parent_id":49606878,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I mean yeah","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:41:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788853280,"id":49606878,"options":[],"parent_id":49606773,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Lol that chart is hilarious when you look at Nvidia.
Always sell shovels in a gold rush I guess","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"aurareturn","children":[{"author":"debugnik","children":[{"author":"aurareturn","children":[{"author":"disgruntledphd2","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:56:15.000Z","created_at_i":1788875775,"id":49610417,"options":[],"parent_id":49607885,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> The point is that the model is already immensely profitable. There is no fundamental reason why AI isn't profitable. It already is.
We'll see I suppose. Until the audited financial statements are released, no-one who doesn't work for an AI lab can be sure.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:31:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788859882,"id":49607885,"options":[],"parent_id":49607766,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The point is that the model is already immensely profitable. There is no fundamental reason why AI isn't profitable. It already is.
Insane competition does not last forever. When chip manufacturing first started, there were dozens of companies that had fabs that made compute chips. Nowadays, only TSMC is viable. Samsung and Intel survived because of geopolitics.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:18:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788859115,"id":49607766,"options":[],"parent_id":49606961,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Keeping up with competition is part of trying to stay in the frontier. If they stop training the profit disappears in a few months.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"mastermage","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-10T07:08:05.000Z","created_at_i":1789024085,"id":49639546,"options":[],"parent_id":49606961,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> The only reason OpenAI and Anthropic are making a loss is due to training new models to keep up with competition - not because the industry is flawed in terms of business model.
So in other words they are not profitable? Like you cant say they are profitable and then in the next sentence say they make a loss. That is not how profit works.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:51:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788853880,"id":49606961,"options":[],"parent_id":49606773,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"AI is profitable. Gross margins are high.
The only reason OpenAI and Anthropic are making a loss is due to training new models to keep up with competition - not because the industry is flawed in terms of business model.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:29:56.000Z","created_at_i":1788852596,"id":49606773,"options":[],"parent_id":49606418,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Revenue is not profit.
https://isaiprofitable.com/","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"pbmonster","children":[{"author":"aurareturn","children":[{"author":"surgical_fire","children":[{"author":"aurareturn","children":[{"author":"surgical_fire","children":[{"author":"aurareturn","children":[{"author":"surgical_fire","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:01:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788879693,"id":49611347,"options":[],"parent_id":49610437,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Are their API token costs highly inflated? I see no evidence of that.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:58:04.000Z","created_at_i":1788875884,"id":49610437,"options":[],"parent_id":49608099,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Are we still calculated $200 subscription token spend based on their highly inflated API token cost and then concluding that they must be losing money on all $200 subscriptions?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"vanuatu","children":[{"author":"surgical_fire","children":[{"author":"vanuatu","children":[{"author":"surgical_fire","children":[{"author":"vanuatu","children":[{"author":"surgical_fire","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T08:52:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788943926,"id":49623382,"options":[],"parent_id":49618432,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"This is not evidence. This is random people speculating on Anthropic's margins without any real evidence.
Just because it is on some blog post, it does not make it true.
I wasted the time to read the first blog post. It considers 100% utilization over the course of years to calculate an estimation, and it did not consider depreciation for the model itself. That thing is extremely extensive to create, and after a relatively short amount of time is considered outdated.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T23:08:46.000Z","created_at_i":1788908926,"id":49618432,"options":[],"parent_id":49613028,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"https://www.seangoedecke.com/ai-inference-is-obviously-profi...
https://www.mindstudio.ai/blog/anthropic-inference-margins-7...
its even higher depending on the model, how optimized it is, and the chips!
I wouldnt die on this hill","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"aurareturn","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T04:44:45.000Z","created_at_i":1788929085,"id":49621108,"options":[],"parent_id":49613028,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"How much work did you go into looking for evidence?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:57:08.000Z","created_at_i":1788886628,"id":49613028,"options":[],"parent_id":49612539,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> serving models is very profitable (70%+)
All your argument hangs on this.
I see no evidence of this being true.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:24:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788884646,"id":49612539,"options":[],"parent_id":49611440,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"serving models is very profitable (70%+) but the issue is you need to invest in training the next iteration. but so far all of anthropics models have been profitable fully loaded
the vast majority of the labs revenue is from enterprise api usage (theres public sources from the information and ramp). but the risk there is customer concentration, where most of the revenue comes from other tech companies and a chunk of it is from foreign labs distilling
so i am drawing a conclusion that the labs' business model is good, maybe not as great as boosters think it is. if they make real progress on the biosciences like drug discovery that could turn it into an amazing business","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:06:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788880018,"id":49611440,"options":[],"parent_id":49611111,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Wihout insight on how much enterprise is paying, it is impossible to draw any conclusions. Unless you have any access to their contracts and are willing to share evidence? I find that highly unlikely.
People here throw around crazy numbers - the dude above was claiming they have some insane good margins, numberd that he took out of his ass.
The only evidence I have is that they are incredibly unprofitable, and they keep raising insane amounts of capital like crazy.
There was a leak sometime ago that they were EBITDA positive during a quarter where they didn't pay for part of their compute. And EBITDA is a cute metric to use when depreciation is actually very important to them, as a model from a year or so ago is nearly worthless.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:48:14.000Z","created_at_i":1788878894,"id":49611111,"options":[],"parent_id":49608099,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Why are we using consumer prices when the vast majority of their revenue is from enterprise api usage?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:58:14.000Z","created_at_i":1788861494,"id":49608099,"options":[],"parent_id":49607902,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Or they bleed money like crazy, and their margins are pretty awful. Which is the correct answer.
Your $200 subscription is a major net loss for them. The vast majority that pays for that would cancel in a heartbeat the moment they had to pay API prices. Which may or may not be profitable, I am not entirely sure. But for the sake of argument, let's assume that it is.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:32:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788859978,"id":49607902,"options":[],"parent_id":49607111,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"
If their margins were anywhere near this good, they wouldn't need to raise so much money so often.\nAnd they will be 800 trilion ARR in a couple of years, following that same rate! 8 quadrillion by 2029!
> When you are growing so fast, you don't need to make a net profit. You just need to make sure your unit economics are good - which it seems like they are given reports that their gross margins are at 60-70%.
If their margins were anywhere near this good, they wouldn't need to raise so much money so often.
If you create a machine that turns 1 dollar into 3 dollars, you don't dillute your ownership of the machine, you use your fabulous profits to expand your machine's capabilities.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:44:00.000Z","created_at_i":1788853440,"id":49606903,"options":[],"parent_id":49606820,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Anthropic is growing 10x revenue every year.
They're likely over $80b ARR by now. They'll be at $800b ARR next year at the same rate. Let's say their growth gets cut down to 3x instead of 10x - that's still $240b ARR by this time next year.
When you are growing so fast, you don't need to make a net profit. You just need to make sure your unit economics are good - which it seems like they are given reports that their gross margins are at 60-70%.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:34:40.000Z","created_at_i":1788852880,"id":49606820,"options":[],"parent_id":49606418,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Is that not self evident by the insane revenue from frontier labs?
No...? Of course not?
Because revenue is only one side of the equation. Did you ever look at total cumulative OPEX and CAPEX, and how long it will take them to even just break even at current growth?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"phtrivier","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:37:11.000Z","created_at_i":1788867431,"id":49608890,"options":[],"parent_id":49606418,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Sure, there is revenue, and market valuation. Is there _profits_ in frontier models ?
What is the horizon for openai and anthropic to _make_ money ? Will they achieve that by charging more for frontier models, or investing slightly less in training frontier models, etc... ?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:48:17.000Z","created_at_i":1788850097,"id":49606418,"options":[],"parent_id":49606353,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yes...?
Is that not self evident by the insane revenue from frontier labs?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:41:28.000Z","created_at_i":1788849688,"id":49606353,"options":[],"parent_id":49606323,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Is there money in frontier?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:37:26.000Z","created_at_i":1788849446,"id":49606323,"options":[],"parent_id":49606195,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Is there money in niche models?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:21:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788848495,"id":49606195,"options":[],"parent_id":49606143,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Maybe true for frontier LLM, but there's plenty of space in the niches. For example, I think their TTS/STT models are pretty good, speaking from personal experience.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"alastairr","children":[{"author":"skeledrew","children":[{"author":"alastairr","children":[{"author":"skeledrew","children":[{"author":"alastairr","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:03:32.000Z","created_at_i":1788883412,"id":49612283,"options":[],"parent_id":49610081,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Again - true now, but not certain to be so in the near future - which (I speculate) is part of the investment case for mistral.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:28:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788874115,"id":49610081,"options":[],"parent_id":49607523,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"If you're taking it at the state level, there's no difference between Chinese and US frontier models. They go with the most accessible, which is the former. Just as trade still happens overwhelmingly between China and US despite the politics.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:53:39.000Z","created_at_i":1788857619,"id":49607523,"options":[],"parent_id":49607393,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"That's true now, but given the strategic importance of AI to nation states and the fractious relationship many have with China, I wouldn't expect the eagerness to use Chinese AI to continue indefinitely.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:36:16.000Z","created_at_i":1788856576,"id":49607393,"options":[],"parent_id":49606225,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Highly improbable given China is ready to pick up any slack.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:24:39.000Z","created_at_i":1788848679,"id":49606225,"options":[],"parent_id":49606143,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"That may be true, but there's a non zero chance that frontier AI becomes a controlled export, and that 'local' production becomes a prudent play.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"koe123","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:53:29.000Z","created_at_i":1788850409,"id":49606463,"options":[],"parent_id":49606143,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They\u2019re in the EU. If they are a year or so behind and things start to plateau they\u2019ll catch up. Americans perhaps don\u2019t realize we can also tariff their digital goods to protect our own. There is a scenario where Americans and Chinese foot the bill and EU gets out cheap, e.g. similar to the Apple approach to AI.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"amelius","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:19:17.000Z","created_at_i":1788873557,"id":49609964,"options":[],"parent_id":49606143,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Maybe because they respect copyright laws?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:15:28.000Z","created_at_i":1788848128,"id":49606143,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I get worried when thinking about Mistral because they make mediocre models and I don't think they will be able to defeat their competition.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"v3ss0n","children":[{"author":"w4yai","children":[{"author":"smurf9852","children":[{"author":"disgruntledphd2","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:49:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788875373,"id":49610332,"options":[],"parent_id":49608886,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Kimi K2 Thinking was apparently build by just 80 people and not more funding.
But they're not competing (offically at least) for GPUs and they have much, much cheaper electricity (which makes pre-training more affordable).","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:36:42.000Z","created_at_i":1788867402,"id":49608886,"options":[],"parent_id":49606215,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"You sure? Kimi K2 Thinking was apparently build by just 80 people and not more funding.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:23:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788848613,"id":49606215,"options":[],"parent_id":49606204,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I actually believe the amount of $ is what was missing for them to improve their fundamental flaws. They're a very competent team, but were working with a tiny fraction of the budget of US/China teams.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"mosselman","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:24:27.000Z","created_at_i":1788848667,"id":49606221,"options":[],"parent_id":49606204,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They've started hosting GLM-5.2, that should be very telling of their capabilities at the moment. Hopefully the investment will allow them to hire the right people to become competitive.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Raed667","children":[{"author":"chronic7304","children":[{"author":"alansaber","children":[{"author":"skeledrew","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:44:09.000Z","created_at_i":1788857049,"id":49607454,"options":[],"parent_id":49606320,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"There is logic to it. The ones who work 12h/day for 6d/week does more than the ones who work 8h/day for 5d/week does more than... It's simple scaling that pays off over time even if the general quality of work by the former isn't as high as that of the latter.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:37:02.000Z","created_at_i":1788849422,"id":49606320,"options":[],"parent_id":49606317,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Holy oversimplification. Do you get all your information from the internet?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"bossyTeacher","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:40:07.000Z","created_at_i":1788849607,"id":49606347,"options":[],"parent_id":49606317,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":">inferior
Way to reduce a multi dimensional concept into a single scalar value. Care to explain what exactly make it inferior? Try using more than one word if you can.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"tokai","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:21:32.000Z","created_at_i":1788855692,"id":49607256,"options":[],"parent_id":49606317,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"In reality US and China are just not efficient enough.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ChrisRR","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:08:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788869338,"id":49609224,"options":[],"parent_id":49606317,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Brand new account, only 1 comment.
Checks out","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"v3ss0n","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-14T06:10:34.000Z","created_at_i":1789366234,"id":49692617,"options":[],"parent_id":49606317,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Thats one of the valid point.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:35:40.000Z","created_at_i":1788849340,"id":49606317,"options":[],"parent_id":49606282,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> can you elaborate what are their fundamental flaws that are not fixable by funds?
Culture.
In terms of output, EU working culture is inferior to American/Chinese working culture.
Work life balance is irrelevant for frontier/sovereign AI.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"alansaber","children":[{"author":"skeledrew","children":[{"author":"adventured","children":[{"author":"skeledrew","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:35:39.000Z","created_at_i":1788874539,"id":49610168,"options":[],"parent_id":49608202,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Those in front can and will change over time, and regions determine what is measured in the first place. So if they want, the EU can for example define "frontier" as "models made by a European nation that score highest on Math benchmarks".","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:10:45.000Z","created_at_i":1788862245,"id":49608202,"options":[],"parent_id":49607474,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It's not really: it means those out in front.
OpenAI, Anthropic, China","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:46:30.000Z","created_at_i":1788857190,"id":49607474,"options":[],"parent_id":49606319,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":""Frontier" is a relative, ever-changing target.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"AureliusMA","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:16:13.000Z","created_at_i":1788858973,"id":49607741,"options":[],"parent_id":49606319,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They have done that in the past. I clearly remember the times when they dropped releases as a simple tweet and it made the front page of HN - just like the recent Chinese models releases.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:36:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788849382,"id":49606319,"options":[],"parent_id":49606282,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They've never made a near-frontier model. Which is a valid criticism for a model training company","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"tristanj","children":[{"author":"alansaber","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:50:29.000Z","created_at_i":1788864629,"id":49608526,"options":[],"parent_id":49606997,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It's dubiously collected data the whole way down. This is the AI industry.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:55:44.000Z","created_at_i":1788854144,"id":49606997,"options":[],"parent_id":49606282,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Chinese models are trained on dubiously collected model traces from Claude/OpenAI that are purchased from model routers. All the major Chinese models use this data. That's one reason they've been able to catch up with Anthropic/OpenAI so quickly, they have so much data.
Mistral can't train on that data, because this data would be illegal to purchase & train on in the EU.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:32:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788849126,"id":49606282,"options":[],"parent_id":49606204,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"can you elaborate what are their fundamental flaws that are not fixable by funds?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"alansaber","children":[{"author":"jhuguet","children":[{"author":"ismailmaj","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:37:15.000Z","created_at_i":1788860235,"id":49607934,"options":[],"parent_id":49607316,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"All original scientist co-founders of H have left.
From what I've seen in the past few months, Mistral is the unique European lab still trying to compete (I wouldn't count Poolside as EU).","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:28:32.000Z","created_at_i":1788856112,"id":49607316,"options":[],"parent_id":49606312,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"there was "H" at paris at the time, they raised 200M or so, but never got so much visibility. don't know at which stage they are now or if they accomplished something","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"flaburgan","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T23:17:43.000Z","created_at_i":1788909463,"id":49618515,"options":[],"parent_id":49606312,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"There is Apertus from Switzerland, a real "lab" project, not a company one.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:35:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788849320,"id":49606312,"options":[],"parent_id":49606204,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"There is nothing exciting about mistral but they're the only european ai lab i've even heard off (jeppa doesn't count)","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"impossiblefork","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:42:27.000Z","created_at_i":1788849747,"id":49606366,"options":[],"parent_id":49606204,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"If Mistral aren't going to distill other people's large models they obviously need to train their own large models. This obviously requires money for optimization, tuning and training hardware.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"koe123","children":[{"author":"Oras","children":[{"author":"koe123","children":[{"author":"Oras","children":[{"author":"koe123","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:44:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788864275,"id":49608474,"options":[],"parent_id":49607156,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Understood! Thats reasonable","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:09:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788854973,"id":49607156,"options":[],"parent_id":49607018,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> > I think the most of the money would go to purchase hardware,
> So it's not a skill issue?
I meant by offering sovereign cloud/inference, not for training. But even if it was for training, Chinese labs have limited supply of GPUs, look what they've done. So it is a skill issue.
Also to clarify, I didn't mean European engineers' skills, I meant "you get what you pay for" as a company, that's why I hope they start offering better compensation to retain talent.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:57:24.000Z","created_at_i":1788854244,"id":49607018,"options":[],"parent_id":49606450,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"My feeling is that its a difference in how funding works in different places. The USA will go all in with the populations pensions on a gamble, the Chinese subsidize. This way of operating is typical for the EU.
> Being one year behind is a skill issue
E.g. if you are an AI researcher in Europe you can just go to USA and make generational wealth. This is not a criticism of the EU model, but rather insane American capex effectively monopolizing.
> I think the most of the money would go to purchase hardware,
So it's not a skill issue?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"blitzar","children":[{"author":"koe123","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:46:16.000Z","created_at_i":1788864376,"id":49608493,"options":[],"parent_id":49607048,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Its not a grift if it works. If a Chinese corp copies at 90% quality at 50% price within a year it means your American business model was never a good one for competing in international markets. The real grift arguably is pretending that it was.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:00:05.000Z","created_at_i":1788854405,"id":49607048,"options":[],"parent_id":49606450,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Chinese models are open, available to distill
Handing in a photo-copy of a photo-copy of a photo-copy of a photo-copy of a photo-copy of a photo-copy of someone else's homework might work once or twice, but it is no way to run a (non grift) business.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"skeledrew","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:49:28.000Z","created_at_i":1788857368,"id":49607489,"options":[],"parent_id":49606450,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Where is that skill coming from in the first place? What are they doing to attract, nurture and keep it?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:52:28.000Z","created_at_i":1788850348,"id":49606450,"options":[],"parent_id":49606386,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Chinese models are open, available to distill, and they also publish papers about their research. Being one year behind is a skill issue.
I think the most of the money would go to purchase hardware, But I hope they can start making adequate compensation for AI engineers and researchers to move forward.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:45:25.000Z","created_at_i":1788849925,"id":49606386,"options":[],"parent_id":49606204,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Honestly being only 1 year behind makes me an optimist. You\u2019re telling me Europe can be slightly behind with 1000x less capex and way more sustainable economics? Awesome. The world moves slower than AI progresses, I can see a scenario where 1 year isn\u2019t a problem.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:22:09.000Z","created_at_i":1788848529,"id":49606204,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"No amount of $ would improve mistral if they cant fix fundamental flaws. They aren't even on par with chinese models a year ago.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"lain98","children":[{"author":"elvennn","children":[{"author":"selestify","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:09:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788851398,"id":49606602,"options":[],"parent_id":49606309,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Care to share any more?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:34:45.000Z","created_at_i":1788849285,"id":49606309,"options":[],"parent_id":49606228,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I applied, I had multiple interviews, I got reject because I was bad during them.
Anyway, the interview process was so janky it decreased my confidence in their success.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"tasoeur","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:58:36.000Z","created_at_i":1788850716,"id":49606514,"options":[],"parent_id":49606228,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I\u2019ve heard many folks get rejected and leave with a bad taste in their mouth. Interviews should make you feel like you\u2019ve failed due to you not being quite there while still recommending friends to apply (\u201cI didn\u2019t make it but you should try to apply!\u201d Vs \u201ci felt like I had the privilege of even talking to the dude and then got ghosted\u201d).","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"colesantiago","children":[{"author":"rytsEa","children":[{"author":"colesantiago","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:46:41.000Z","created_at_i":1788868001,"id":49608985,"options":[],"parent_id":49608340,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Not many can execute, but people are welcome to try if you can get customers.
Better than throwing CVs everywhere with no response for years.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:27:49.000Z","created_at_i":1788863269,"id":49608340,"options":[],"parent_id":49606515,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I am sure plenty of people had the same thought.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:58:49.000Z","created_at_i":1788850729,"id":49606515,"options":[],"parent_id":49606228,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Instead of trying to get into Mistral, why don't you make your own Mistral?
Not easy as it sounds yes, but it is better than throwing your CV into the ATS void 1000 times (the wrong way to apply for a job btw)
Mistral have no moat as it seems except some 'regulatory' moat.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"danialtz","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:22:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788880975,"id":49611684,"options":[],"parent_id":49606228,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Well, I applied for a senior role and didn\u2019t even get a rejection email, while recommending their technology to DE enterprise execs on daily basis.
From both the hiring and enterprise adoption sides, it\u2019s easy (and disappointing) to see why the US/China seems so far ahead.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:24:46.000Z","created_at_i":1788848686,"id":49606228,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I've been applying to jobs at Mistral, just straight rejects.
Not even a phone call :(","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Morkeeth","children":[{"author":"throwa356262","children":[{"author":"alansaber","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:38:09.000Z","created_at_i":1788849489,"id":49606327,"options":[],"parent_id":49606279,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Stay out of the race sounds insane when AI is, and will be, a common commodity. China is getting great bang for their buck on AI training, why not the same for Europe?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"aurareturn","children":[{"author":"throwa356262","children":[{"author":"aurareturn","children":[{"author":"throwa356262","children":[{"author":"aurareturn","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:39:11.000Z","created_at_i":1788871151,"id":49609538,"options":[],"parent_id":49608645,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Small efficient models are commodities.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:06:34.000Z","created_at_i":1788865594,"id":49608645,"options":[],"parent_id":49607083,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"On the contrary, small efficient models using recent improvements should be more sustainable than huge frontier models that require billions and years to train","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"r4rf","children":[{"author":"aurareturn","children":[{"author":"philipwhiuk","children":[{"author":"aurareturn","children":[{"author":"philipwhiuk","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T20:16:40.000Z","created_at_i":1788898600,"id":49616384,"options":[],"parent_id":49610405,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The obvious draw-down on resources being used by companies following the token price hikes?
The fact that in the testimonials both frontier labs quote the same company (who I'm led to believe is still tokenmaxxing).
The fact that we've not seen actual productivity benefits or new products resulting from people outside the companies using it and a lot of things that in most businesses would result in a lot of investor skepticism and concern.
The fervent development and focus on 'the next big thing'.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:55:31.000Z","created_at_i":1788875731,"id":49610405,"options":[],"parent_id":49610086,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"So what makes their AI business fundamentally unsustainable?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:29:23.000Z","created_at_i":1788874163,"id":49610086,"options":[],"parent_id":49609534,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It's pretty easy to use accounting wizardry to have one profitable quarter.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:38:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788871131,"id":49609534,"options":[],"parent_id":49609416,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Why is it not sustainable when Anthropic has already had a profitable quarter?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:28:03.000Z","created_at_i":1788870483,"id":49609416,"options":[],"parent_id":49607083,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":""Impressive doesn't mean sustainable."
The frontier labs at the current rate are also not sustainable.
You make some incredibly stupid assumptions - like assuming revenue growth rate of Anthropic and OAI will continue on.
Elon-Musk type stuff. lmfao.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:03:02.000Z","created_at_i":1788854582,"id":49607083,"options":[],"parent_id":49607055,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Impressive doesn't mean sustainable.
We're also seeing behemoths like Google and Meta both fail to keep up with OpenAI and Anthropic. Microsoft has given up on SOTA training. Loads of once promising LLM training companies are no longer relevant at the SOTA stage such as Cohere, Mistral.
I've said this countless times but SOTA LLM market looks like a classic monopoly/duopoly market over time. Each generation requires magnitudes more resources to train and you can only compete if you've made enough money on your previous generation.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:00:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788854455,"id":49607055,"options":[],"parent_id":49606351,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"My reasoning is that we have seen multiple small labs come out of nowhere and create impressive models.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Zambyte","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:20:15.000Z","created_at_i":1788859215,"id":49607784,"options":[],"parent_id":49606351,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The vast majority of people simply don't need SOTA models. I run most of my programming on a single 7900 XTX with Qwen 3.8 27b. I'm more interested in scaling out to run more instances of the model in parallel, than I am in scaling up to better models.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:41:01.000Z","created_at_i":1788849661,"id":49606351,"options":[],"parent_id":49606279,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I\u2019m still looking for no-moatists to logically explain why there is no moat in SOTA LLMS.
That paper released by a lone Google employee 3 years ago still misguiding people it seems.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"codingbot3000","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:18:56.000Z","created_at_i":1788859136,"id":49607770,"options":[],"parent_id":49606279,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":""Probably safer to stay out of the race for now."
What kind of attitude is that?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:31:32.000Z","created_at_i":1788849092,"id":49606279,"options":[],"parent_id":49606252,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I don't know.
The moat doesn't seem to exist. Probably safer to stay out of the race for now.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"eloisant","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:22:13.000Z","created_at_i":1788852133,"id":49606703,"options":[],"parent_id":49606252,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"On the contrary, Europe needs a wider AI ecosystem and not rely on just one company","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:27:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788848826,"id":49606252,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Europes last chance","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"_r4uh","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:28:11.000Z","created_at_i":1788848891,"id":49606259,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Too bad Mistral fucking sucks","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"donmb","children":[{"author":"HenrikPontoppid","children":[{"author":"Slartie","children":[{"author":"HenrikPontoppid","children":[{"author":"gmueckl","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:03:21.000Z","created_at_i":1788858201,"id":49607625,"options":[],"parent_id":49606529,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Replce "best" with "most fit for purpose" and you're right. The future won't be a one size fits all kind of deal because hardware availability constraints will eventually punish oversized models even more.
I think that there's a real second mover advantage in letting others waste money on researching ultra oversized models while creating smaller and cheaper models from their learnings.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:00:28.000Z","created_at_i":1788850828,"id":49606529,"options":[],"parent_id":49606421,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The value of these companies is not defined entirely by the state of their current models. A much more important signal is their chance of having the best model in the future. Just like with anything having to do with investment, this is the castle in the sky. Also, shame on me for simplifying things so much - but I still believe in my original sentiment.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"whiplash451","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:02:46.000Z","created_at_i":1788850966,"id":49606551,"options":[],"parent_id":49606421,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"OpenAI and Anthropic are so close on benchmarks and release date that they are essentially ex-aequo at this point. The market is just hedging their bets.
There is no close second, because the AA Index points are expentially harder to get as you get closer to the first.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"andsoitis","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:08:21.000Z","created_at_i":1788851301,"id":49606590,"options":[],"parent_id":49606421,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> So how does this match up to the fact that there is currently OpenAI and Anthropic, both raking in money? They can't both have the smartest model at the same time, can they?
They are simultaneously first: the two leapfrog each other with regularity, and are meaningfully ahead of the competition.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"adventured","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:01:44.000Z","created_at_i":1788861704,"id":49608134,"options":[],"parent_id":49606421,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Samsung is now essentially tied for being the world's most profitable company with Nvidia ($62b operating profit last quarter, vs $63b for Nvidia). They're drowning in cash. They're doing the same thing Nvidia has been doing: distributing the money to their business partners, to try to drive business growth faster (and or to keep it all propped up).","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:48:45.000Z","created_at_i":1788850125,"id":49606421,"options":[],"parent_id":49606345,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Well, then Samsung Electronics appears to be dumb for leading this investment round? They probably only do it because they're European...oh, wait...
> so if you don't have the most intelligent or cheapest model in the world, you're losing
So how does this match up to the fact that there is currently OpenAI and Anthropic, both raking in money? They can't both have the smartest model at the same time, can they? And all those inference companies selling API access to open weight models on OpenRouter, which are apparently also earning billions already? While the former are probably bound to have much higher cost for research and training than they are currently earning, which may be called "losing", the latter don't have that problem, they can simply price their API access such that the money earned covers their costs, no training and practically no research necessary. In your theory these companies shouldn't have a cent of earnings.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"eloisant","children":[{"author":"user43928","children":[{"author":"eloisant","children":[{"author":"user43928","children":[{"author":"Slartie","children":[{"author":"user43928","children":[{"author":"Slartie","children":[{"author":"user43928","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:30:12.000Z","created_at_i":1788877812,"id":49610860,"options":[],"parent_id":49610196,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Why don't you give some examples of tasks that you think fall into this category, where AI assistance only is the perfect solution and which could not conceivable be done more effectively autonomously by more capable models?
For coding, I don't see it.
Physical tasks? I don't know, it's not my area of expertise. I do not think AI is widely deployed for physical tasks yet, not even the SOTA is good enough.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:38:28.000Z","created_at_i":1788874708,"id":49610196,"options":[],"parent_id":49608937,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"A harness of limited capability is a component that doesn't exist in your proposal, right? Just like non-automatable or at least hard-to-automate things like physical actions to be performed in the real world as part of a business task do not exist, too? Same goes for coordination with other real humans - doesn't exist.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:42:31.000Z","created_at_i":1788867751,"id":49608937,"options":[],"parent_id":49608741,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I propose that there is no such sweet spot.
If the model cannot perform the task with adequate quality while being many times faster and cheaper than a human, it is not good enough in my view.
If a SOTA model would be good enough, surely that would be preferable to a human using cheap AI assistance for a moderate efficiency improvement.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:18:53.000Z","created_at_i":1788866333,"id":49608741,"options":[],"parent_id":49608614,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"You call it "lack of ambition", implying a certain arrogance; more humble people might just call it "a different sweet spot" of AI integration. After all, the goal in the end is not to use up as many AI tokens as possible, but the goal is to implement/perform a certain business case in the best way possible with regard to cost/speed/quality.
It's not like everyone using AI has the same software development cycle. It's not even that everyone using AI is developing software.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:01:26.000Z","created_at_i":1788865286,"id":49608614,"options":[],"parent_id":49607642,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I suspect that opinions in that direction might be the result of a lack of ambition in applying agentic AI.
The cheap models are good enough for what exactly? AI assisted development, or working autonomously on a task for 4 hours?
As long as the best available model does the latter more reliably and with noticeably better results, it is easily worth spending a few hundred per month for me.
The idea that OpenAI and Anthropic cannot make enough profit in my opinion depends entirely on how large the gap is going to be.
Will the gap become smaller with improvements starting to slow, or will it get wider as the labs successfully apply their models to research and improvements speed up?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:04:46.000Z","created_at_i":1788858286,"id":49607642,"options":[],"parent_id":49607305,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I'm sure you can tell the difference.
But for the vast majority of usage GLM 5.3 or Deepseek V4 is enough.
Even people who do need frontier model will soon restrict it to the use cases that really need it and switch to cheaper models for the rest. It has already started.
Anthropic and OpenAI will never get enough customers paying top dollar to deliver on the revenue they need to offset their investments.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:27:24.000Z","created_at_i":1788856044,"id":49607305,"options":[],"parent_id":49606618,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I can tell the difference between the SOTA and GLM 5.3, and paying a few hundred for the better models is definitely worth it.
Mistral does not offer a model that makes sense to use. I understand they now host the already outdated GLM 5.2, courtesy of China providing the weights. And Mistral offers this for 2x-3x the price of other providers.
This is supposed to be a success story?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:13:07.000Z","created_at_i":1788851587,"id":49606618,"options":[],"parent_id":49606345,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> It is my conviction that in this space, if you're not the best in the world, you're losing
I disagree on that point. Models are getting good enough that you can switch them and barely notice. I'm switching between Opus, GPT Codex and GLM 5.3 for coding and I can barely tell the difference.
I think they'll become more like telcos than anything, selling a commodity. It's even truer when any provider can host open weight models like GLM-5.3.
Basically a world with dozens of Baseten, with AI labs having a hard time monetizing, just like editors of open source software.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"mondrian","children":[{"author":"barrenko","children":[{"author":"jononor","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:54:27.000Z","created_at_i":1788882867,"id":49612150,"options":[],"parent_id":49609703,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"That is not great. But it is still better than other continents?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:54:49.000Z","created_at_i":1788872089,"id":49609703,"options":[],"parent_id":49606665,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"A new ICE line between Antwerpen and Koln opened up the last week. The first train was half an hour late, the distance is under 250 km.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"u8080","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:32:23.000Z","created_at_i":1788877943,"id":49610883,"options":[],"parent_id":49606665,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"also electronics, social networks and electric cars","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:18:00.000Z","created_at_i":1788851880,"id":49606665,"options":[],"parent_id":49606345,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Europe is a different beast. They build and distribute rails, they don\u2019t compete on frontier capabilities. When the civic benefits of AI become clear, EU is in a position to mandate their distribution. US develops capabilities that remain stuck in heterogeneous corporate silos without interop. Payments is a good point of comparisons between the two approaches.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"powerapple","children":[{"author":"AureliusMA","children":[{"author":"powerapple","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-12T08:55:44.000Z","created_at_i":1789203344,"id":49670412,"options":[],"parent_id":49607631,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"how could I naively think this is going to be the technology to free human from being the slave of work.... of course, it is going to be a weapon, and it is only powerful when no one else has it.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:03:31.000Z","created_at_i":1788858211,"id":49607631,"options":[],"parent_id":49606685,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It\u2019s very possible that the people saying AGI is a winner takes all are indeed referring to warfare.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:20:03.000Z","created_at_i":1788852003,"id":49606685,"options":[],"parent_id":49606345,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I don't get it when people all claim that AGI is a winner takes all game. It is not (unless it is used as a weapon). When one company reaches AGI, there will be a dozen very close to AGI, given time. Also a winner is not going to drive everyone else out of business, it is the opposite, one winner will have people betting on the second and the third winners, the technology will also help other develops. Once you have a good enough model, everything will be incremental. I think the hardware capability will be the real burden, not the model itself. If AGI is as powerful as it sounds, maybe hardware won't be a problem any more.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"tsimionescu","children":[{"author":"Iolaum","children":[{"author":"tsimionescu","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T07:44:31.000Z","created_at_i":1788939871,"id":49622778,"options":[],"parent_id":49615560,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"How do you confirm that you did enough pre-train and post-train to remove the relevant bias/backdoor?
Note that I'm not singling out Chinese models here. The same question and concern should apply to any model you use - in security critical scenarios, you need to ask yourself if you can trust the provider, since the artifact, the model itself, is far too complex to audit and trust.
Given most AI companies' ties to the weapons industry and spying apparatus of their host countries, it would be absurd to think that burying some kind of malicious payload in the models has not at least been contemplated, and I would bet it has been at least attempted. We know retrospectively this was the case with many previous technologies (remember the backdoored encryption that the NSA tried for so long to push), so it would be naive to think it's not at least plausible with AI.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T19:26:15.000Z","created_at_i":1788895575,"id":49615560,"options":[],"parent_id":49609820,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yes but what about taking an open weight Chinese model and do some extra pre-train and post-train to remove any potential hidden backdoors?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:04:15.000Z","created_at_i":1788872655,"id":49609820,"options":[],"parent_id":49606345,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> any open-weight self-hosted chinese model might as well have been made by Von der Leyen herself.
This is simply wrong. Plenty of security-sensitive companies and agencies disallow the use of any Chinese model out of hand. Given the black box nature of LLMs, the fact that it's "open weight" is irrelevant to the trust calculus, and the fact that it's self hosted barely adds anything.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:39:38.000Z","created_at_i":1788849578,"id":49606345,"options":[],"parent_id":49606293,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"When it comes to what really matters, they're far behind and probably will not catch up. It is my conviction that in this space, if you're not the best in the world, you're losing. Everyone is fundamentally selling the same thing, so if you don't have the most intelligent or cheapest model in the world, you're losing. Sure, Mistral has a "Made in Europe" edge, but any open-weight self-hosted chinese model might as well have been made by Von der Leyen herself.
Also, \u20ac3B is nothing in this market, especially when you're competing with more efficient competitors. \u20ac3B in Europe is probably the same as \u20ac10B in the USA and \u20ac20B or \u20ac30B in China.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"vintagedave","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:42:11.000Z","created_at_i":1788849731,"id":49606362,"options":[],"parent_id":49606293,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"That's kinda damning with faint praise, but I agree, I am glad to see something. I've been disappointed in their coding ability -- it's where I'm most focused, I've built and we are selling a (specialised) coding agent -- and hopefully investment will give them the ability to achieve more in their research and model development.
They have been focusing largely on government and business not consumer, which is fine. Perhaps coding is not something they want to achieve, but they do provide Codestral. It's a signal it's a market of interest to them.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"0xDEAFBEAD","children":[{"author":"Slartie","children":[{"author":"0xDEAFBEAD","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:05:18.000Z","created_at_i":1788851118,"id":49606571,"options":[],"parent_id":49606471,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I didn't say to hide it. My suggestion is to create international AI safety rules which companies must be in compliance with if they want to buy and service ASML machines.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:54:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788850460,"id":49606471,"options":[],"parent_id":49606412,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Ehm, sorry, but no, this is not how lithography works. You cannot "hide" functionality in circuitry your machines are producing if your machines' job is to shine light through a mask.
You'd have to be the producer of the machine producing the mask. Or, even better, the software that produces the plan according to which a machine produces a mask.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"orphereus","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:58:53.000Z","created_at_i":1788850733,"id":49606516,"options":[],"parent_id":49606412,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It couldn't tell ASML to do that because ASML doesn't do chip design.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:48:03.000Z","created_at_i":1788850083,"id":49606412,"options":[],"parent_id":49606293,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Europe could tell ASML to put kill switches in GPUs so Europe has leverage to "safeguard" AI deployments in other countries.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Towaway69","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:04:18.000Z","created_at_i":1788851058,"id":49606563,"options":[],"parent_id":49606293,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Europe is at least trying
Which is interesting since who are the investors and what exactly are their roles? Samsung - European? BlackRock - European? Salesforce Ventures - European? Etc.
So yes it might well be
> [...] the largest equity fundraising round ever completed by a European technology company, three years after the company's launch.
but the money isn't European.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"eloisant","children":[{"author":"pembrook","children":[{"author":"Foobar8568","children":[{"author":"w3ll_w3ll_w3ll","children":[{"author":"kiney","children":[{"author":"chrystianpl","children":[{"author":"hoihoihoi","children":[{"author":"KajMagnus","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:54:03.000Z","created_at_i":1788882843,"id":49612143,"options":[],"parent_id":49607720,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"At least you have good fabs!","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:14:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788858862,"id":49607720,"options":[],"parent_id":49607412,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Korea as well :)","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:38:52.000Z","created_at_i":1788856732,"id":49607412,"options":[],"parent_id":49607289,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"and Poland","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:25:48.000Z","created_at_i":1788855948,"id":49607289,"options":[],"parent_id":49607131,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"and Germany","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:07:32.000Z","created_at_i":1788854852,"id":49607131,"options":[],"parent_id":49606927,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Add Italy please.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:46:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788853593,"id":49606927,"options":[],"parent_id":49606909,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Not just legacy dying industry. \nWhole IT in France and Switzerland runs on consultancy.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:44:42.000Z","created_at_i":1788853482,"id":49606909,"options":[],"parent_id":49606588,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"If there\u2019s one thing the legacy, dying industrial companies of Europe love, it\u2019s consulting.
So they\u2019ll probably make more money creating PowerPoints with ChatGPT than they will trying to compete with the US and China.
Which would be the most European outcome ever.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"rich_sasha","children":[{"author":"chriscyber","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-12T00:06:44.000Z","created_at_i":1789171604,"id":49667123,"options":[],"parent_id":49608895,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Agree","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:37:41.000Z","created_at_i":1788867461,"id":49608895,"options":[],"parent_id":49606588,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I think Europe was at risk of being left without even a foot in the door. Mistral os one of few such feet. Just having some compute and know how for running Chinese models is better than nothing. Low bar I know but still. Who knows what R&D they\u2019re doing while keeping the business running.
I\u2019m not sure really what the winning strategy is in this weird arms race.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"u8080","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:22:34.000Z","created_at_i":1788877354,"id":49610753,"options":[],"parent_id":49606588,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"No, they are just worse and more expensive then frontier chinese models","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"illiac786","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T05:16:28.000Z","created_at_i":1788930988,"id":49621362,"options":[],"parent_id":49606588,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I don\u2019t think their pitch is being the cheapest or frontier.
Sovereign, data privacy, these are their strengths. Or even being not US and not Chinese; this is in itself an advantage nowadays. (Which is crazy)","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:08:08.000Z","created_at_i":1788851288,"id":49606588,"options":[],"parent_id":49606293,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The problem is that they're in a weird position between US models and Chinese models. Not as performant as US models, not as cheap as Chinese models.
Especially as Chinese models are getting better Mistral is getting less and less relevant.
It pains me because I want them to succeed, but despite them denying it I believe they'll end up restrict their activity to (1) selling hosting for Chinese models (they're already hosting GLM) and (2) selling AI-related consultant service (they're also doing that already).","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"BoredomIsFun","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:13:23.000Z","created_at_i":1788858803,"id":49607711,"options":[],"parent_id":49606293,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral is odd. They have made mostly flops, boring models (Ministral 3, Mistral Small 4, Small 3, Small 3.1) together with a classic masterpiece Mistral Nemo and very good Mistral Large 2407, Mistral Small 22b, Mistral Small 3.2.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"moffkalast","children":[{"author":"Slartie","children":[{"author":"applicative","children":[{"author":"Slartie","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T22:34:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788906891,"id":49618098,"options":[],"parent_id":49608865,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Where exactly do you take the knowledge from that this strategy is indeed not a strategy, but was retrospectively declared a strategy by the West?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:33:47.000Z","created_at_i":1788867227,"id":49608865,"options":[],"parent_id":49608459,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Their \u2018open weight strategy\u2019 was invented, to Chinas surprise, by the Western press after the DeepSeek event. Of course all the actual systems like Baidu, Bytedance are closed weight and basically all anyone uses. Meanwhile the advanced system are crossing security frontiers: soon only inferior models will be \u2018open\u2019 (as with OpenAI, even) the rest closed. \u2014 Or where open weighted, they will be impossible to run without a private data center, come with absurd \u2018security scrutiny\u2019 licenses like GLM is starting \u2014 or licensing requiring a cut, as with Kimi, which is basically a scheme to get western companies to do buildout for them","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:42:12.000Z","created_at_i":1788864132,"id":49608459,"options":[],"parent_id":49607910,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"China is actively tripping the US up by pushing the open-weight strategy, which is kind of smart. They realized that they obviously will not be able to make Western companies trust Chinese companies enough to just use proprietary models by sending all their data to services hosted by Chinese companies. The US is still able to attract this trust, although it's eroding quickly in spite of recent political events and the current trust is more or less a function of old habits that need some time to change. But China correctly found that - due to there being no old habits to piggyback on - they wouldn't ever be able to compete in this way, even if they had proprietary foundation models superior to their US counterparts, so they decided to throw sticks into the spokes of the US frontier labs by releasing top open-weight models worth billions of dollars in training cost and thereby devaluing the huge proprietary investments of the US labs.
That is absolutely not "do nothing".","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"barrenko","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:56:13.000Z","created_at_i":1788872173,"id":49609716,"options":[],"parent_id":49607910,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Europe is not China, I repeat we are not China, they build stuff. A guy from Austria ended up on Chinese national TV due to the bizarre way he had to obtain an AC unit this summer. Let's stop the larp.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:34:36.000Z","created_at_i":1788860076,"id":49607910,"options":[],"parent_id":49606293,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":""Do nothing, win." is already China's strategy after all. Though they are far from doing nothing in the LLM space.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"hakunin","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:50:38.000Z","created_at_i":1788875438,"id":49610351,"options":[],"parent_id":49606293,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I've made a personal doc tool based on Mistral OCR API at first, and then switched to Gemini Flash for the same price inline, or half price using batch API, and the difference is night and day. Mistral doesn't even come close on anything non-trivial. Longer story here: https://max.engineer/ringbinder","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:33:16.000Z","created_at_i":1788849196,"id":49606293,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral is not that bad as the comments here suggest. I am not using it as a frontier model but with simple RAG tasks and its doing great. Also OCR is pretty decent. It's a positive development that Europe is at least trying. Alternative would be: do nothing.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"davedx","children":[{"author":"dwedge","children":[{"author":"intended","children":[{"author":"21asdffdsa12","children":[{"author":"nickpp","children":[{"author":"notahacker","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:54:44.000Z","created_at_i":1788857684,"id":49607540,"options":[],"parent_id":49607063,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> I heard there used to be dozens of plane-building companies when the field was unregulated, with new, more efficient models and lower prices appearing regularly. I wonder what happened.
I heard that this is nonsense. There never were more than a handful of large aircraft builders (still are plenty of small ones), safety records certainly weren't better in the era before consolidation, and new entrants funded by the might of their governments have failed not because of regulation but because what airlines actually want is lots of identical aircraft from a reliable supplier and the new entrants haven't really been competitive in terms of performance either. The certification is complex, but so's building an aircraft, and it's really only the people further down the supply chain that need the protective umbrella...","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"intended","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:02:49.000Z","created_at_i":1788872569,"id":49609802,"options":[],"parent_id":49607063,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"But Boeing and Airbus kept desiging and building new and improved planes.
There are multiple aircraft manufacturers for smaller aircraft, and there are several showing up for electric aircraft today.
For jets, the capex required to build them is massive, and its never going to have an upstart just up and build a jet.
The regulations in place are the reason why its safe to fly, and airlines have the safety records they do.
This is the degree of safety end consumers want to be reassured that its safe to fly. The checks and balances in places create the market that you are hoping to give over to cheaper upstarts.
The market doesn't exist without that safety regulation.
See how people feel uneasy when flying Boeing after the decay of their engineering and quality culture became public knowledge.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:01:13.000Z","created_at_i":1788854473,"id":49607063,"options":[],"parent_id":49606517,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Great example. An highly regulated field (aerospace) put so many barriers of entry for startups and competition that the incumbents simple have to reason to innovate or even compete anymore.
I heard there used to be dozens of plane-building companies when the field was unregulated, with new, more efficient models and lower prices appearing regularly. I wonder what happened.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:58:56.000Z","created_at_i":1788850736,"id":49606517,"options":[],"parent_id":49606483,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"And in the long run, regulated market companies win out- while the de-regulated ones decay and enshittify. Boeing vs Airbus comes to mind.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"prolly97","children":[{"author":"boonzeet","children":[{"author":"ricardobayes","children":[{"author":"prolly97","children":[{"author":"ricardobayes","children":[{"author":"prolly97","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:14:27.000Z","created_at_i":1788866067,"id":49608705,"options":[],"parent_id":49608144,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Awesome! \nBut, looking at the numbers the decrease in totals are due to fewer registered "street crimes", less fraud and legalization of cannabis (removing a 183k comparable from 2016). \nViolent crimes however went from 193,542 to 212,335. With rapes almost doubling, going from 7,919 to 14,454 (82%). Murders remained stable though.
We can debate which of these crimes have a greater impact on the feeling of safety. Personally I don't really feel unsafe due to people being caught stealing a sweater or smoking weed (when that was illegal).
So I don't think this is as clear cut as the headline number makes it seem. \nI feel like it's valid if people want to put more weight on the violent crimes.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:02:47.000Z","created_at_i":1788861767,"id":49608144,"options":[],"parent_id":49607779,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I can quote the German BKA:
number of crimes in 2016: 6,372,526
number of crimes in 2025 (last data): 5,508,559
https://www.bka.de/EN/CurrentInformation/Statistics/PoliceCr...
https://www.bka.de/EN/CurrentInformation/Statistics/PoliceCr...","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:19:42.000Z","created_at_i":1788859182,"id":49607779,"options":[],"parent_id":49606789,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":">Despite the average european objectively being better off and safer than a decade ago
I'm sure it's true, but do we have some statistics on that, and a comparison to places that doesn't have the same regulatory burden?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:31:19.000Z","created_at_i":1788852679,"id":49606789,"options":[],"parent_id":49606619,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I wouldn't even call it a communication problem - I believe it's more a media problem, than anything. Good news are minimized and bad news are amplified to the maximum - nowadays even broadsheet newspapers operate with tabloid headlines, and that is really bad.
We somehow need to "want" a slower news cycle and simultaneously push back against the algorithmic outrage. The world is more predictable and safer than ever but the perception of the average person is not this, it's manufactured outrage at every possible opportunity and topic.
Despite the average european objectively being better off and safer than a decade ago, almost none feel that way and that is almost 100% due to the news algorithms being tuned to keep you in a constant dread cycle.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"nickpp","children":[{"author":"prolly97","children":[{"author":"boonzeet","children":[{"author":"prolly97","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:46:11.000Z","created_at_i":1788871571,"id":49609605,"options":[],"parent_id":49609024,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"haha, yes, this is 100% just me overfitting then!
And it's not as if there aren't a bunch of somewhat arbitrary regulation in the US either. \nBut the general sense I got from the US, was that people still feel agency to improve their reality, and that there's fewer artificial barriers to that end. \n(Except for building houses in California. omg. That sounds like a horrible horrible process. At least for those I spoke to).","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:50:07.000Z","created_at_i":1788868207,"id":49609024,"options":[],"parent_id":49607886,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I\u2019m not sure that\u2019s a function of regulation but more a function of most modern freezers defaulting to -18\u00b0, where an American or industrial freezer is -22 to -28\u00b0C.
Getting a better energy efficiency score is one reason (and consumers are motivated on running cost, not just environmental) but presumably these are cheaper to manufacture as well.
I have an American style, EU-compliant freezer than I can set to -26\u00b0 which I bought for preparing sashimi safely. It rocks! Highly recommend them.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:31:23.000Z","created_at_i":1788859883,"id":49607886,"options":[],"parent_id":49606969,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"This!!!
I went to California earlier this year.\nIn our apartment we had a freezer that was clearly made before politicians thought to decide to put a cap on how good a freezer could be.\nIt was fucking amazing at freezing stuff. No freezer I've ever used could freeze this good.\nIt was probably from the 80's - old/sturdy AF.
I wouldn't mind paying for some extra solar panels to feed it.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"lentil_soup","children":[{"author":"prolly97","children":[{"author":"lentil_soup","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:32:18.000Z","created_at_i":1788874338,"id":49610117,"options":[],"parent_id":49609286,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I never tried to dispute the fact, I'm disputing the idea that we should be free to opt out of benefits that have been agreed as the minimum requirements to do business in a society. I would actually go further and argue that allowing that freedom would lead to everyone being worse off. Having minimum standards in a society gives a solid foundation on which to build, can't think of any society that doesn't have them.
A way more interesting conversation would be where to regulate, how much, for how long, what impacts would it have in innovation, etc not that I want to be free to get sold broken goods.
> as if anyone would purchase their goods from purveyors known to disregard food safety
How would you know they disregard food safety if there's no regulation on what food safety means?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:16:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788869782,"id":49609286,"options":[],"parent_id":49608186,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"He's stating a fact that you don't dispute. \nYou follow up with hyperbolic language; "eating rotten food" (as if anyone would purchase their goods from purveyors known to disregard food safety).
In a market that has been designed to let people take part in voluntary transactions, we also design methods for making sure that the counterpart takes responsibility, and delivers the agreed amount quality of product.
If you purchase a car that won't turn on, you're in your good right to make a claim against the producer. Same for all the other things you mention. And people do.
You're making a point about negative externalities. Agreed that a factory shouldn't just be able to poison a river, because there's no tangible cost to piping your dirty water to one. Here it makes sense to make artificial interventions, in my opinion.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:09:43.000Z","created_at_i":1788862183,"id":49608186,"options":[],"parent_id":49606969,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> But the worst is that I must pay for those benefits whether if I want them or not
that regulation acts as a lower bound on what it takes to do business in the place. You also pay for companies not dumping toxic material on the streets, for appliances not catching fire, for not eating rotten food and million other things. All of those regulations of course "corrupt" the market for the good of a society so it's not just a race to the bottom. The idea of a free for all market is an utopia that doesn't exist ... thankfully.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"intended","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:35:19.000Z","created_at_i":1788867319,"id":49608877,"options":[],"parent_id":49606969,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"That... that is not exactly how things work.
The choices you are presented with, are always a function of market structure, aka the interplay of incentives, regulation, and competition.
You have a market because your taxes pay for many things, ranging from policing, to courts, to power and standards underlying how various systems work.
The choices presented to you are always a trade off vs other options. Having regulation that dictates how plug points and voltage works for example, reduces the choices you have, but the baseline standard means many other things can be built because standardization enables modularity.
The position that there exists some platonic ideal "choice" isn't even useful as an illustrative argument in this context.
Markets that are effective at ensuring better outcomes for the median or average consumer are things that have to be crafted. Figuring out the correct extent of intervention, (whether you champion less regulation or more) is the issue.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:52:14.000Z","created_at_i":1788853934,"id":49606969,"options":[],"parent_id":49606619,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> cooling off [...] seller liability [...] Right to repair
Let's not forget I am paying directly for those when I buy a product. Those benefits are not free, they cost money. The money has to come from somewhere. It can't come from profits (since those are the sacred reason the company exists in the first place) thus they will come from higher prices.
Higher product prices mean less competitive companies. It also means fewer startups which must implement the required regulation no matter the market says. Then you need protectionism against Chinese competition.
But the worst is that I must pay for those benefits whether if I want them or not. Thus my choice is reduced. I cannot vote with my wallet and send price signals in the market to tell sellers that I want those benefits or not and at what price. The market gets corrupted. The economy falters. Outside competitors gain. The Government needs to intervene again and again, growing stronger and more intrusive "for my own benefit".
It's the decay spiral we are witnessing here in the EU right now.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:13:08.000Z","created_at_i":1788851588,"id":49606619,"options":[],"parent_id":49606554,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"There are many EU directives which benefit consumers directly in tech, including, but not limited to:
Consumer rights - 14 day cooling off period for online purchases
Sale of goods - 2 year seller liability for defective goods
Right to repair - likely doesn\u2019t need explanation, require manufacturers to offer repairs and replacement parts
Unfair commercial practices - prevent misleading or deceptive advertising
Unfair contract terms directive - prevents disproportionately one-sided provisions in T&Cs (think Disney giving themselves legal immunity for a free Disney+ trial)
The EU\u2019s problem seems to be in communicating its benefits to its citizens.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"pdhborges","children":[{"author":"nickpp","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:04:08.000Z","created_at_i":1788854648,"id":49607091,"options":[],"parent_id":49606640,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Maybe you should get that list from the European AI products that came from those awesome EU regulations.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"prolly97","children":[{"author":"pdhborges","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:47:03.000Z","created_at_i":1788878823,"id":49611091,"options":[],"parent_id":49607759,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I took it in good faith I just think that:
- the overregulation narrative conflates two different problems
- and that you minimized too much the consumer benefits of EU legislation
I think the overregulation problem olis less that we have 200 EU regulations and we need to hack and slash 100 of them and more that we have 100 national regulations 25 are exact transcriptions of EU directives, 25 are transcriptions with tweaks and the other 50 are national scoped regulations and what we need to do is to make them uniform so that companies don't have to deal with 27x75 problems.
I'm a bit burned by politicians using the overregulation narrative and then not specifying a single example of a meaningfull rule that they would get rid of. Usually what is left in the air is that worker rights and consumer rights should be cut.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:17:41.000Z","created_at_i":1788859061,"id":49607759,"options":[],"parent_id":49606640,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I don't think you're taking my "there's two sides to regulation" comment in good faith.
I gave a pretty clear example of pro-consumer regulation myself.
Saying that the EU is overregulating cannot possibly be that controversial, given that even the European politicians are beginning to admit it.. Draghi, Von der Leyen (even though she passes blame), Merz, Macron.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:15:26.000Z","created_at_i":1788851726,"id":49606640,"options":[],"parent_id":49606554,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Do you believe I can't get a list of 20 effective pro-consumer regulations drafted by the EU out of Gemini?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"vrganj","children":[{"author":"prolly97","children":[{"author":"dns_snek","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:39:56.000Z","created_at_i":1788863996,"id":49608435,"options":[],"parent_id":49607936,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> (48) The extent of the adverse impact caused by the AI system on the fundamental rights protected by the Charter is of particular relevance when classifying an AI system as high risk. Those rights include the right to human dignity, respect for private and family life, protection of personal data, freedom of expression and information, freedom of assembly and of association, the right to non-discrimination, the right to education, consumer protection, workers\u2019 rights, the rights of persons with disabilities, gender equality, intellectual property rights, the right to an effective remedy and to a fair trial, the right of defence and the presumption of innocence, and the right to good administration. [...]
> (57) AI systems used in employment, workers management and access to self-employment, in particular for the recruitment and selection of persons, for making decisions affecting terms of the work-related relationship, promotion and termination of work-related contractual relationships, for allocating tasks on the basis of individual behaviour, personal traits or characteristics and for monitoring or evaluation of persons in work-related contractual relationships,
> should also be classified as high-risk, since those systems may have an appreciable impact on future career prospects, livelihoods of those persons and workers\u2019 rights. Relevant work-related contractual relationships should, in a meaningful manner, involve employees and persons providing services through platforms as referred to in the Commission Work Programme 2021.
> Throughout the recruitment process and in the evaluation, promotion, or retention of persons in work-related contractual relationships, such systems may perpetuate historical patterns of discrimination, for example against women, certain age groups, persons with disabilities, or persons of certain racial or ethnic origins or sexual orientation. AI systems used to monitor the performance and behaviour of such persons may also undermine their fundamental rights to data protection and privacy
I suggest reading the regulation(s), it usually does a good job laying down the reasoning in the preamble.
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2024/1689/oj/eng","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:37:17.000Z","created_at_i":1788860237,"id":49607936,"options":[],"parent_id":49606656,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Why shouldn't it be possible to completely automate decisions? \nImaginary entry level job, where you need to deliver parcels from one business to another. \nQualifications: 1. Drivers license. 2: Eyes in your head. \nApplicant 1: Drivers license? No. Eyes in your head? Yes. \nApplicant 2: Drivers license? Yes. Eyes in your head? Yes.
Reject applicant 1 and accept applicant 2. Ez.
I'd prefer to work at a place that uses it's ressources on things that provide value. If we're able to conserve ressources by automating hiring, I'm all for it. \nI don't want to take a pay-cut to hire meat-proxies.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:17:23.000Z","created_at_i":1788851843,"id":49606656,"options":[],"parent_id":49606554,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"That's not even true in the concrete case we're talking about here.
As part of the AI Act, an important decision on a person (such as a hiring decision) cannot be made without human involvement.
You think that's not in favor of "consumers"? (also note the implicitly submissive framing of humans as receptacles for consumption instead of subjects with rights!)","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:02:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788850975,"id":49606554,"options":[],"parent_id":49606483,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"There's a big difference between governments regulating to benefit their own control and power, and regulating in favor of consumers. \nMost regulation in the EU have jack-all to do with consumers. There's a couple of niceties - having all prices displayed in comparable unites (EUR/kg, EUR/liter etc). But apart from that the regulation have broadly served as moats around the largest businesses.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"blfr","children":[{"author":"vichle","children":[{"author":"blfr","children":[{"author":"t43562","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:52:12.000Z","created_at_i":1788864732,"id":49608541,"options":[],"parent_id":49607142,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"These are effective monopolies competing to become super monopolies - the period leading up to dominance by one or two is beneficial to consumers with freebies and cheap offers that also completely lock out any smaller players.
If you don't let such things develop in the first place then there's not enough money to round out and scale the product. So if we want world beating products we may need monopolies but we can nationalise them in the same way we nationalised big infrastructure in the past. Then at least we're not the tail wagging the dog anymore.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"robotresearcher","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T05:23:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788931435,"id":49621418,"options":[],"parent_id":49607142,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"You do. ASML, ARM, Linux (originally), Spotify, Logitech. Novartis, Astra Zenica.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:08:18.000Z","created_at_i":1788854898,"id":49607142,"options":[],"parent_id":49606990,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Why hasn't strong competition arise from well-regulated EU? Where are the superior European products? I'd gladly use them.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:54:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788854091,"id":49606990,"options":[],"parent_id":49606641,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They've been pretty efficient in squashing any potential competition because of that weak regulation, yes. Don't confuse it with competing on the merits of their products.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:15:29.000Z","created_at_i":1788851729,"id":49606641,"options":[],"parent_id":49606483,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Right now the weakly regulated American market is delivering staggering competition where massive corporations are fighting tooth and nail over my 100 bucks.
I kept hearing the same about previous age tech and there also Americans rule the Internet: Google Search, Workspace or m365, AWS, Cloudflare... Even Linus moved to the US.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"nickpp","children":[{"author":"intended","children":[{"author":"nickpp","children":[{"author":"intended","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:55:13.000Z","created_at_i":1788872113,"id":49609708,"options":[],"parent_id":49609525,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Actually, in the real world, the worst markets are also the strongest regulated: housing, education and health care.
> Meanwhile the fields that got to be regulated last brought us the most wealth, advances and innovation: high tech & software.
Financial markets are highly regulated. They are one of the most structured markets out there.
The outcomes in all those markets, whether they are good or bad, is a direct result of how the markets are structured.
The 2008 financial crisis, for example, was a direct result of regulators being defanged and underfunded for multiple years.
If you look at technology: innovation amazing in the era of unlimited horizons, the era of "move fast and break things."
However, the cost of externalities from inventions like social media, were not captured in that market structure. This means that firms can absolutely pollute or addict people in the information economy, capturing the profit but socializing the costs.
The ability of dominant players to consume/acquihire upstarts and keep their market position, is a drag on innovation and consumer outcomes today.
The situation that was faced in the early days of a new technology is different than what is faced in its maturity, when the advantages of the nimble upstart give way to the massive overlord.
At each stage, you have to craft the incentives and rules to ensure you achieve the outcomes you (as a nation) actually priortize.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:37:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788871078,"id":49609525,"options":[],"parent_id":49607553,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> If you want good markets you need good regulation and incentive structuring.
Actually, in the real world, the worst markets are also the strongest regulated: housing, education and health care.
Meanwhile the fields that got to be regulated last brought us the most wealth, advances and innovation: high tech & software.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:56:19.000Z","created_at_i":1788857779,"id":49607553,"options":[],"parent_id":49607012,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yes.
This is always going to be the case, because regulation is typically a form of friction.
It is the shape of regulation that matters, and ideology on either side of the divide is religion.
Good regulation and regulators would punish anti competitive behavior, but this will also act as a drag on firms, while preventing firms from reaching certain sizes and potential economies of scale.
The point is that regulation deserves to be understood and crafted well.
Those economies of scale are meaningless to consumers if it means a single firm squeezes everyone in the supply chain and captures the benefit for itself.
This is also a specific weakness in American conversations. The divide between free markets, competition, and regulation are ideological.
If you want good markets you need good regulation and incentive structuring.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"dns_snek","children":[{"author":"nickpp","children":[{"author":"dns_snek","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:07:12.000Z","created_at_i":1788876432,"id":49610555,"options":[],"parent_id":49609249,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Not having regulation is also "not free" because it imposes external costs on the rest of society. The goal of regulation is to reduce these external costs and instead impose them on the people (broadly) responsible.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:11:17.000Z","created_at_i":1788869477,"id":49609249,"options":[],"parent_id":49608160,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> regulation [...] is not free
> that amount can't be zero because
Sounds like you're agreeing with my point.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:05:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788861920,"id":49608160,"options":[],"parent_id":49607012,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"That's not true. EU regulations like the AI Act and Digital Services Act have different obligations and requirements for large and small businesses and that amount can't be zero because being a small business doesn't give you a free pass to cause damage to society.
I'd be curious to hear about specific examples of AI regulation that affect small businesses without a good reason.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:56:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788854193,"id":49607012,"options":[],"parent_id":49606483,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"And it bears repeating: regulation (even well meaning regulation) is not free and it always favors incumbents and hinders startups.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ywvcbk","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:57:15.000Z","created_at_i":1788854235,"id":49607016,"options":[],"parent_id":49606483,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Markets, left to their own devices, do not end up automatically being competitive in favor of consumers.
True. Does not mean all regulation is increases competition and marker efficiency by default. If anything EU has long abandoned the core tenets of Ordoliberalism and "Social Market Economy"","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:55:30.000Z","created_at_i":1788850530,"id":49606483,"options":[],"parent_id":49606378,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It bears repeating - all markets get regulated.
Markets, left to their own devices, do not end up automatically being competitive in favor of consumers.
But above all, if AI wasn\u2019t hyped as a threat to humanity, to jobs, to security, regulation could have been cautious.
To add insult to injury, given how voters are tired of technology, expecting a different move from governments is a losing bet.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"mazurnification","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:56:04.000Z","created_at_i":1788850564,"id":49606490,"options":[],"parent_id":49606378,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"This is strategy of laggers. Everybody do that when found themselves in the situation. Including US and China.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"pavlov","children":[{"author":"dwedge","children":[{"author":"Aeolos","children":[{"author":"eloisant","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:19:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788859173,"id":49607777,"options":[],"parent_id":49606788,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yes, now that they are in place they want to put barriers for new entrants.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:31:14.000Z","created_at_i":1788852674,"id":49606788,"options":[],"parent_id":49606650,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Did you miss the Anthropic and OpenAI blog posts screeching for regulation?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"stanac","children":[{"author":"notahacker","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:36:01.000Z","created_at_i":1788856561,"id":49607390,"options":[],"parent_id":49606790,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They've both been insisting that humanity's survival is contingent on regulation since the start and employ armies of lobbyists to try to shape the policies they want that hold significant sway in their own country. But of course Americans doing this is smart and entrepreneurial...","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:31:25.000Z","created_at_i":1788852685,"id":49606790,"options":[],"parent_id":49606650,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Didn't both Amodei and Altman called for regulation of open-weight models? Not that long ago on xitter....","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"oblio","children":[{"author":"jryle70","children":[{"author":"oblio","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:46:48.000Z","created_at_i":1788875208,"id":49610291,"options":[],"parent_id":49609298,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49599059
> I would just ban US software companies like China did (I'd obviously also ban Chinese software companies, too). The resulting chaos would end up with some pretty solid EU software companies, the know how is there.
I'm all for following positive examples, as long as we keep democracy. We don't need to copy everything, just the good parts.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:17:59.000Z","created_at_i":1788869879,"id":49609298,"options":[],"parent_id":49606810,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Ah, "Americans are awful. Now we can be just awful"
> they also call for banning Chinese models and open weights models...
So I guess Anthropic called for banning Chinese models when they said "but let me state it clearly so that there is no doubt: Anthropic has never advocated for a ban on open-weights models."? - [0]
May be they imply it? They work behind the scene for it? well, who knows. My guess is as good as yours. But since we're acting like a child, bending the truth is allowed?
By the way, China is decisive. They just banned outright Claude and Open AI. I guess no open arguments about regulation is good?
[0] - https://www.anthropic.com/news/position-open-weights-models","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:33:36.000Z","created_at_i":1788852816,"id":49606810,"options":[],"parent_id":49606650,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Meh, OpenAI and Anthropic are doing the same. The US shtick is "our models are too powerful, government, please hold them back (and buy 10% of the company)".
Edit: forgot, they also call for banning Chinese models and open weights models...","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:16:49.000Z","created_at_i":1788851809,"id":49606650,"options":[],"parent_id":49606624,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Sure but it's not the government calling for regulation, it's Mistral. At times they seem like a government mouthpiece to check the waters, which I could accept if their models were at least any good","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ywvcbk","children":[{"author":"moffkalast","children":[{"author":"rafaelmn","children":[{"author":"microtonal","children":[{"author":"ywvcbk","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T06:28:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788935302,"id":49622005,"options":[],"parent_id":49613462,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Airbnb maybe, in Europe booking.com seems to have better deals even if they offer similar service to Airbnb these days.
Uber and other ride sharing apps improved UX immensely and still are cheaper for consumers than regular taxes.
> their monopoly position to maximize money extraction.
Neither AirBnB or Uber are anywhere close to being monopolies aside from maybe a few markers that I'm not aware of.
> you cannot hire all your employees as contract workers and deprive them of their benefits
For employees yeah, pay and conditions are not great compared to normal taxi drivers OTH the demand is higher and there are more "jobs" on aggregate.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:26:16.000Z","created_at_i":1788888376,"id":49613462,"options":[],"parent_id":49612202,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"You benefitted temporarily. Those offering the service are often worse off. Various regulatory bodies had to beat these companies into submission, that no, you cannot hire all your employees as contract workers and deprive them of their benefits. After the competition is murdered, they will raise their prices over and over again.
All these companies thrive on the externalization of costs and killing an economy to then use their monopoly position to maximize money extraction.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"moffkalast","children":[{"author":"ywvcbk","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T06:29:17.000Z","created_at_i":1788935357,"id":49622013,"options":[],"parent_id":49614659,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> the contract workers are the ones taking the
True, OTH it's not obvious that these jobs would even exist in the first place without Uber/etc. since demand has certainly increased","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:33:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788892438,"id":49614659,"options":[],"parent_id":49612202,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I think in this case, the contract workers are the ones taking the L, generally. Taxis are not overpriced just from a lack of competition, but because they are an actual full time job with all that comes along with it, and not well.. part time gamified bullshit where you fight for scraps.
Most of the does EU has Uber now, and Wolt and some others, so it's not like we avoided anything there in practice though.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"waterTanuki","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T01:19:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788916791,"id":49619506,"options":[],"parent_id":49612202,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Hi, fellow American here.
Me and quite a few others are getting real tired of the constant name-dropping of mega-corporations that do not care about your safety, health, or well-being. This does not resonate with anyone except a small circle of wealthy tech elitists.
If they can make a profit from those things, great, but they will also not hesitate to make a profit from your suffering as well. Ask the lung doctors of the people living next to xAI's data centers if their patients are better off than before.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:57:56.000Z","created_at_i":1788883076,"id":49612202,"options":[],"parent_id":49607903,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"How exactly ?
We heard this since Uber days and all it did was break the old taxi systems and brought taxi service to a wider audience. As a consumer I benefited immensely from Uber.
Likewise for AirBnB and hotels.
Not saying that these don't have secondary effects on the society - but as a consumer they were and arguably still are pretty amazing.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:33:29.000Z","created_at_i":1788860009,"id":49607903,"options":[],"parent_id":49606996,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Oh one hand sure, on the other, moving fast and breaking things is exactly where the customer ends up footing the bill or suffering damages.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:55:43.000Z","created_at_i":1788854143,"id":49606996,"options":[],"parent_id":49606624,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"There is regulation that is effective and useful (e.g. plenty of consumer protection laws) and regulation that actually makes markets more competitive and efficient. Then there is a lot of what EU is doing which leads to less efficient markets and more stagnation.
Even a lot of their attempts to increase competitiveness like forcing Apple to allow alternative app stores have been halfassed and not very effective.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:13:29.000Z","created_at_i":1788851609,"id":49606624,"options":[],"parent_id":49606378,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"After living in the US for several years, I was happy to return to the EU where regulations exist to protect against the worst corporate behavior.
My American bank sold my credit card transactions to advertisers. My American mobile operator had insane fees for roaming and other features that are basic in Europe. Sending a bank transfer in America was unreliable and slow and expensive because there was nothing like SEPA instant 24/7 free transfer (I guess FedWire does that nowadays, I don\u2019t know if consumers actually have guaranteed access at all banks like they do in EU).
When American AI companies become established Fortune 100 members, they\u2019ll start abusing their customers just like all the others in that club, those banks and phone operators and \nMicrosoft and the rest. Google once pretended to be different, now they have the corporate cancer. No reason to believe the same won\u2019t happen to OpenAI and Anthropic.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"dns_snek","children":[{"author":"mhitza","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:37:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788885442,"id":49612720,"options":[],"parent_id":49606767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Read this https://europe.mistral.ai/ if you can bare to go through the slop, has it's share of regulatory capture strategy.
Here's the HN discussion https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47743700","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:29:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788852562,"id":49606767,"options":[],"parent_id":49606378,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Which provisions of which regulation are you complaining about, related to AI?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"BoredomIsFun","children":[{"author":"hobofan","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:30:25.000Z","created_at_i":1788870625,"id":49609443,"options":[],"parent_id":49607687,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Regulation != censorship. (Apart from that, Mistral has Shieldstral[0] for adding policy enforcement).
With it's general approach of Open Weights, and being able to be deployed on-premise (/private/public cloud), they are a viable solution for your typical European enterprise, that has to comply with traditional (non-AI) regulation. With the NIS2 directive the amount of those companies is also significantly expanding.
We[1] are in the same market as Mistral, and among our customers, the go-to-solution of MS Copilot is typically performing badly, and the typical SaaS solutions are not even given a consideration, which is why they are reaching for on-premise-first solutions.
[0]: https://mistral.ai/news/shieldstral/
[1]: https://github.com/EratoLab/erato","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:10:23.000Z","created_at_i":1788858623,"id":49607687,"options":[],"parent_id":49606378,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> They are regulationmaxxing instead of benchmaxxing, that's my problem with them.
To those who is in know (r/localllama, r/sillytavernai), is well aware that Mistral models - at least the small, <=24b ones - are the least censored, even less than Chinese.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"davedx","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:36:59.000Z","created_at_i":1788867419,"id":49608888,"options":[],"parent_id":49606378,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Don't make me laugh. Who has actually sat in Congress and told congress leaders to push regulatory capture?
Not Mistral","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"stymaar","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:15:19.000Z","created_at_i":1788869719,"id":49609277,"options":[],"parent_id":49606378,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"You're confusing with Anthropic .
They are definitely feeding off the fear of US control from US companies and institutions, but you can't blame them for reaping the benefits of Trump's lunacy.
Amodei and Altman on the other hand are relentlessly pushing for regulation to bar open weight competition from eating their lunch.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:44:31.000Z","created_at_i":1788849871,"id":49606378,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They are regulationmaxxing instead of benchmaxxing, that's my problem with them.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"matusp","children":[{"author":"black_puppydog","children":[{"author":"randomgermanguy","children":[{"author":"oblio","children":[{"author":"nickpp","children":[{"author":"oblio","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:57:25.000Z","created_at_i":1788857845,"id":49607568,"options":[],"parent_id":49607119,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"We used to have some. Also, regarding labor, that part boggles the mind. Aren't those factories supposed to be highly automated?
Also, at this point DRAM availability is becoming a security risk.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ezst","children":[{"author":"nickpp","children":[{"author":"ezst","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:34:03.000Z","created_at_i":1788874443,"id":49610144,"options":[],"parent_id":49609342,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Ecologism is a hobby for people with full bellies.
Then it's a good thing that Chinese bellies are satisfied, we can get to those existential problems, now.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"oblio","children":[{"author":"nickpp","children":[{"author":"oblio","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T10:59:03.000Z","created_at_i":1788951543,"id":49624437,"options":[],"parent_id":49622119,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> And most of the pollution happens in the other part.
Where does it happen exactly?
> All for naught too, because when the orc armies come (attracted by our weakness to even defend ourselves) they will do the the environment what they did in Ukraine\u2026
Who are the orcs here? Russia? Europe is rearming like it's the 1980s.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-09T06:39:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788935946,"id":49622119,"options":[],"parent_id":49610530,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Almost the entire planet where this debate is raging, is the part of the planet where people have full bellies.
Exactly. And most of the pollution happens in the other part.
We\u2019re crippling our economies and render our companies uncompetitive to merely export environmental effects around, while pushing our voter base to the extremes.
All for naught too, because when the orc armies come (attracted by our weakness to even defend ourselves) they will do the the environment what they did in Ukraine\u2026","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:05:18.000Z","created_at_i":1788876318,"id":49610530,"options":[],"parent_id":49609342,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Ecologism is a hobby for people with full bellies.
Almost the entire planet where this debate is raging, is the part of the planet where people have full bellies. On average, too full, even.
Ecologism is also a hobby for people that don't want their kids to starve, as people living in Mesopotamia around the time of Akkad, or people around the Sea of Aral starting in the 1980s have discovered.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:22:09.000Z","created_at_i":1788870129,"id":49609342,"options":[],"parent_id":49607705,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> all workers around the world want the exact same thing, a livable planet for their children
Actually, they don't. First of all they want livable conditions for themselves. Ecologism is a hobby for people with full bellies.
I remember during communism which failed to even feed and clothe us - but The Party kept telling us that we were actually winning and we were so morally superior to those "corrupt capitalists". This is what happens when ideological justifications replace rational thought.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:12:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788858771,"id":49607705,"options":[],"parent_id":49607119,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Doesn't matter, we need to opt out of the rat race that consists of making the planet worse for the next generations in exchange of quick bucks for the oligarchs.
The way is to factor externalities in the final price, reward sustainable behaviour and set better standards. And that's what's going on:\n https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/12/how-europes-new-...
The same applies to labour conditions and quality standards. And don't bring up arguments like "it can't work" or "that hurt competitiveness": all workers around the world want the exact same thing, a livable planet for their children. The only ones to object are the global elite who one ends up defending when they make the current status quo sound inevitable.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:06:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788854811,"id":49607119,"options":[],"parent_id":49606841,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> I would fund a DRAM maker in Europe.
I wouldn't. I can think of at least 10 regulations (labor and environmental chef amongst them) that would render such a maker uncompetitive from the start. Chinese makers would eat its lunch.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:36:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788853018,"id":49606841,"options":[],"parent_id":49606491,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I would rather LLM cost curves go down 10x and then we really do something.
We need a lot more hardware for universal LLMs (probably 10x, if not more), and we need it to be cheaper.
If anything, I would fund a DRAM maker in Europe.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:56:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788850566,"id":49606491,"options":[],"parent_id":49606444,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"But a better model almost always comes with a better dollar-per-task-accomplished ratio, compared to worse models.
So not only outpriced, outperformed, but also outregulated.
Idk i wish there was some bright light in the future, but i dont see it","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"selcuka","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:58:23.000Z","created_at_i":1788850703,"id":49606511,"options":[],"parent_id":49606444,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Those things are not mutually exclusive. We can have open weight, yet close-to-frontier models. China has very strong models that can also run locally.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"realusername","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:08:27.000Z","created_at_i":1788851307,"id":49606591,"options":[],"parent_id":49606444,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"That's true, however, if you are too far from the top models, you still are in danger of not being in the race anymore.
And with half the score of the top models, that's where Mistral is at.
As it is now, no tech company in the EU will use it, if they were just 80% from the top, that would be more feasible.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"adventured","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:52:26.000Z","created_at_i":1788861146,"id":49608056,"options":[],"parent_id":49606444,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Why hasn't Baidu taken over the world's search market?
What moat does Google have that's so special in search?
You need to spend hundreds of billions of dollars to scale globally in search. And you have to take the market away from Google at the same time. Good luck.
OpenAI and Anthropic are doing that right now in LLMs, hyper scaling to a billion people. Having a billion users you can actually serve is a moat.
When OpenAI is done attaching a full ad model to GPT, they'll be able to serve a billion users profitably globally with zero subscriptions. This is what keeps Google up at night: ~$500 billion in ad revenue up for grabs circa 2030.
Any service with hundreds of millions of users is a lucrative ad business. TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, Google, Amazon.
OpenAI's moat, if they get there soon enough, is that they'll be able to lean into a high margin ad business to press down on the market and kill everybody. You won't be able to serve the infrastructure to compete at the cost structure they'll able to subsidize at via the high margin ad business. This is an extraordinarily straight-forward move, and it's comically anti-competitive, and nobody will stop them from doing it. Their mistake is that they're at least two years behind where they should be in advertising.
Anthropic is the one at the most risk from the Chinese models, they have the weaker everyday consumer side. Enterprise won't be supported by an ad model very well.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"matusp","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:52:45.000Z","created_at_i":1788861165,"id":49608062,"options":[],"parent_id":49606444,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"How much money are Europeans paying to US companies for AI services and how much are Americans paying to EU companies? I don't think it's a good idea to let billions of dollars go to other countries because you couldn't be bothered to build a competitive product.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:50:54.000Z","created_at_i":1788850254,"id":49606444,"options":[],"parent_id":49606389,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"We're regularly getting demonstrations that being at the frontier is no moat at all. "Run open weights locally" was literally on the HN front page a few days ago as a primary concern/competitor for the big US labs. So there's a big and meaningful gap between "not frontier" and "bottom feeder". There's just tons of applications where you don't need "the best" model, especially not tomorrow's best model.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"gman83","children":[{"author":"pferde","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:31:25.000Z","created_at_i":1788852685,"id":49606791,"options":[],"parent_id":49606655,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Thank god.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"grim_io","children":[{"author":"pferde","children":[{"author":"grim_io","children":[{"author":"pferde","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-10T09:55:51.000Z","created_at_i":1789034151,"id":49641093,"options":[],"parent_id":49610295,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"We're still deep in the research and exploration phase, who knows what will huge oodles of compute be useful for in the end? Maybe it will end up being used by the owning corporation or local nation state, against similar amount of compute wielded by another corporation or nation state.
After all, what else than governments and corporations will be left after the rest of us poors will inevitably be priced out of the economy?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:46:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788875215,"id":49610295,"options":[],"parent_id":49608020,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"What is the AI arms reace to you?
Isn't it to be the globally dominant provider of such a service? Everything else is in service of that goal.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:48:04.000Z","created_at_i":1788860884,"id":49608020,"options":[],"parent_id":49607272,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"No, I think most of the recent huge datacenter buildups are for US AI efforts only in the AI arms race, not to be rented out.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:23:36.000Z","created_at_i":1788855816,"id":49607272,"options":[],"parent_id":49606655,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"There is a big difference in compute requirements between EU and US.
EU needs to meet their own demand, the US wants to be the global provider.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"lII1lIlI11ll","children":[{"author":"gman83","children":[{"author":"44ff","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:55:29.000Z","created_at_i":1788886529,"id":49613002,"options":[],"parent_id":49609338,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"This is nonsense.
Money flows globally. The question is why are investors choosing not to invest as much in Europe?
Access to money isn't the issue.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:21:44.000Z","created_at_i":1788870104,"id":49609338,"options":[],"parent_id":49608153,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Power is the easy part; the hard part is where the check comes from.
One single frontier computing cluster costs some \u20ac30-40B initially and becomes virtually worth zero every four years. That\u2019s the equivalent of France\u2019s full-year VC market for all industries combined times three. A single Member State, already indebted far beyond sustainable limits, cannot subsidize expensive, long-term 40bn\u20ac hardware risks from its national budget more than 33 times without both falling foul of state aid rules and blowing up the debt crisis even more seriously than it already is.
The three factors you mention, missing VCs, political reluctance, and brain drain, are by-products of exactly these fragmented fiscal structures. European capital is not missing; it is frozen at 33T\u20ac (roughly) in risk-averse national bank deposits and Member State pension regulations instead of in one unified Capital Markets Union to pay for high risks related to enormous tech bets. Similarly, leading researchers are not looking to work on a better salary but for liquid equity, which is not available at the high valuations seen in the NASDAQ through deeply integrated public markets.
With insufficient scale for an entire continent in finance, even the best AI valley in a single country will hit the wall much faster than a US hyper-scaler investing greater amounts in CAPEX in one single quarter than every member state treasury.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:04:04.000Z","created_at_i":1788861844,"id":49608153,"options":[],"parent_id":49606655,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Underwriting gigawatt data centers and frontier models demands a fully realized European Capital Markets Union, a single energy regulator with cross-border grid integration, and shared fiscal borrowing power.
Care to elaborate why you consider this an absolute must? I don't see why, say, France can't build an "AI valley" somewhere near to on of their nuclear power plants and commit to provide X amount of energy for some fixed price for a decade. To me the main reasons for not building top AI labs with frontier models in EU seems to be:
- Venture money is not there (or people controlling the money are not on board to invest into such labs).
- Weak political will from countries who could do that to actually go for it.
- Top scientist who could work on it choosing to go for much higher payouts in the US.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:17:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788851840,"id":49606655,"options":[],"parent_id":49606389,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"No, Europe doesn't have the capital markets required to build the required data centers. Underwriting gigawatt data centers and frontier models demands a fully realized European Capital Markets Union, a single energy regulator with cross-border grid integration, and shared fiscal borrowing power.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"KronisLV","children":[{"author":"simgt","children":[{"author":"KronisLV","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:57:02.000Z","created_at_i":1788857822,"id":49607564,"options":[],"parent_id":49607526,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I mean the EU has ASML, why can\u2019t we go the rest of the way? Seems kinda shortsighted and I say that as someone who bought the Intel Arc A580 on release and don\u2019t regret it.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"infamia","children":[{"author":"simgt","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T20:36:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788986166,"id":49633845,"options":[],"parent_id":49611254,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":""Planning" has a very different meaning when referring to what France did, what the USSR did, and what China is doing. Remains to be seen if China is at a disadvantage.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:55:59.000Z","created_at_i":1788879359,"id":49611254,"options":[],"parent_id":49607526,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"In the long run a planned economy is a huge disadvantage, the Soviets and now the the CCP are prime examples. For instance, the CCP is also sitting on a bunch of practically empty metropolises, paired with a property bubble and a falling population (all of which are exist to their meddling).","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:53:44.000Z","created_at_i":1788857624,"id":49607526,"options":[],"parent_id":49606890,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> I\u2019m surprised that there\u2019s no domestic chip production either, we don\u2019t have our own CPUs or GPUs, meanwhile China is spinning up manufacturing so they don\u2019t have to work around the Nvidia export restrictions as much.
The CCP is able to plan the economy. We used to be able to do that in the 60s-70s, at least in France, but that mindset is long gone.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"NekkoDroid","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:16:11.000Z","created_at_i":1788862571,"id":49608251,"options":[],"parent_id":49606890,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> I\u2019m surprised that there\u2019s no domestic chip production either, we don\u2019t have our own CPUs or GPUs, meanwhile China is spinning up manufacturing so they don\u2019t have to work around the Nvidia export restrictions as much.
I haven't heard of updates on ESMC in a while, but that has been a thing on the horizon for a while, with production planned to start in fall 2027 last I read.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:42:32.000Z","created_at_i":1788853352,"id":49606890,"options":[],"parent_id":49606389,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"To compete, we\u2019d have to throw a lot of the regulations and laws into the trash (especially anything regarding copyright) and do an order of magnitude more investment.
I\u2019m surprised that there\u2019s no domestic chip production either, we don\u2019t have our own CPUs or GPUs, meanwhile China is spinning up manufacturing so they don\u2019t have to work around the Nvidia export restrictions as much.
I like Mistral and there\u2019s cool stuff going on like how EuroLLM models know Latvian language and all the other EU ones better than way bigger models, but we don\u2019t have anything frontier.
At the very least, they should be distilling Kimi K3 and GLM 5.3 as much as possible and working on MoE models like ~35B and ~120B versions to match Qwen.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"throw1234567891","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:42:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788853371,"id":49606894,"options":[],"parent_id":49606389,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"you mean like Boeing vs Airbus?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"simgt","children":[{"author":"lII1lIlI11ll","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:57:17.000Z","created_at_i":1788861437,"id":49608093,"options":[],"parent_id":49607491,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> We're not in a good position on the supply chain needed. Right now it really means pouring billions on American corps, either by renting the compute or by building it.
You are saying "right now" as if EU is seriously investing into developing its own AI hardware (both training and inference) but I'm not aware of any serious attempts to build such supply chain in EU.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:49:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788857391,"id":49607491,"options":[],"parent_id":49606389,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"We're not in a good position on the supply chain needed. Right now it really means pouring billions on American corps, either by renting the compute or by building it. That would be mostly fine if it were only VC money but it's not.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:45:37.000Z","created_at_i":1788849937,"id":49606389,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"This is a bottom feeder mentality. Europe has enough bright people and resources to truly compete in the AI race. There is something wrong when the only selling point is that it's local.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"shevy-java","children":[{"author":"himata4113","children":[{"author":"ulfw","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:30:17.000Z","created_at_i":1788856217,"id":49607334,"options":[],"parent_id":49606423,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"LOL yea as if that was the reason for LLMs","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:48:57.000Z","created_at_i":1788850137,"id":49606423,"options":[],"parent_id":49606407,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Because it's increasingly obvious that this is the next step in our capabilities as humans competing with that of the discovery of bacteria and transistors.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"21asdffdsa12","children":[{"author":"mastermage","children":[{"author":"21asdffdsa12","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:39:11.000Z","created_at_i":1788853151,"id":49606862,"options":[],"parent_id":49606714,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"If life is a exponential curve, the moment we stopped overproducing exponential energy and ate the planet up for this.. that was when we stalled.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:23:37.000Z","created_at_i":1788852217,"id":49606714,"options":[],"parent_id":49606532,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The last 50 years is a wild take considering thats the time in with the computers became a bigger thing, mobile phones, smart phones. CRISPR, mRNA Vaccincs, HIV Antivirals, HPV Vaccines, We friggin confirmed the Higgs Boson and Gravity Waves. Found thousands of other worlds outside the solar system. Lithium Ion Batteries, the modern solar panel making solar power the cheapest energy source in most of the world. Blue LEDs making RGB LEDs a thing. Reusable Orbital Rockets.
Where in the fuck did we stall out?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ulfw","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:30:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788856235,"id":49607339,"options":[],"parent_id":49606532,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Please speak English so that an LLM can understand you","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:00:31.000Z","created_at_i":1788850831,"id":49606532,"options":[],"parent_id":49606407,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Because humanity stalled out- and coasted for the last 50 years and it shows. And now it must compete and git good or git gone. No more fat ponies paraded as race-horses.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:47:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788850042,"id":49606407,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I fail to see how this is relevant with regards to areas.
Whether AI is hosted by the USA, Europe or China - they all are awful and eliminating real jobs while also driving up RAM prices etc... Why should I want to support any of these?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"alexfortin","children":[{"author":"ywvcbk","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:53:31.000Z","created_at_i":1788854011,"id":49606979,"options":[],"parent_id":49606535,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> once they're good enough for coding aid
The gap has only been increasing, though. Devstral 2 was obviously not great compared to Claude/GPT but kind of acceptable if you were willing to compromise. There has been no real progress since then and frontier labs are massively ahead.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"maxhille","children":[{"author":"alexfortin","children":[{"author":"maxhille","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T14:47:16.000Z","created_at_i":1788965236,"id":49627515,"options":[],"parent_id":49626359,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They switched from using mistral-medium to GLM 5.2 in Vibe","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-09T13:37:48.000Z","created_at_i":1788961068,"id":49626359,"options":[],"parent_id":49608706,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Serving GLM-5.2? can you elaborate?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:14:44.000Z","created_at_i":1788866084,"id":49608706,"options":[],"parent_id":49606535,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They are now serving GLM52 and the 15\u20ac sub comes with a nice included quota. So I get good code assist and pay a EU company for it.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:00:59.000Z","created_at_i":1788850859,"id":49606535,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I root for Mistral and hope they'll be successful, perhaps I'll buy a subscription too once they're good enough for coding aid (perhaps they are now, didn't do any test with their models recently).
First of all, they release the models' weights, perdonally I don't consider any other option as viable (no OpenAI and definitely no Anthropic, thank you).
I especially like their Vibe Chat web offer, the allowed monthly usage with a free account is incredibly generous (still have to hit a limit) and the deep research feature (5/month for free) is also valuable.
I don't know anything about the alleged regulation maxxing problems, I don't perceive them as a problem for my causal/personal usage anyway.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"blfr","children":[{"author":"zorked","children":[{"author":"blfr","children":[{"author":"slopinthebag","children":[{"author":"ifwinterco","children":[{"author":"slopinthebag","children":[{"author":"ifwinterco","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:39:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788863975,"id":49608425,"options":[],"parent_id":49607169,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yep same with latest Claude models - code isn't really any better than Opus 4.5/4.6, but use 5x as many tokens doing random stuff that's mostly unnecessary.
And yeah still for some reason they often can't understand how to set up any project locally without handholding, which is something you'd think an LLM would actually be good at","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:10:38.000Z","created_at_i":1788855038,"id":49607169,"options":[],"parent_id":49607041,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yeah that's kinda my point. I'm not sure if the models have gotten that much smarter, but they're certainly getting more capable. That's not the same thing though.
There are things GPT 6.0 can accomplish for me that 5.3 was not able to. But there are also things it still fails at, and it doesn't seem to be much better at the big picture. It does spam about 100x more tests though and I wonder if just RLHFing it to test everything constantly is carrying it more. 6.0 writes so many tests and spends so much time verifying it's work in python sandboxes. Slow as hell but it tends to get things right the first time more which is good, I guess. I don't love the thought of a 500loc feature adding +4000loc due to tests though.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:58:57.000Z","created_at_i":1788854337,"id":49607041,"options":[],"parent_id":49606774,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"To be fair Opus 4.6 was genuinely a really good model when it came out, in fact I'm not sure Opus 5 is even any better.
It's definitely a lot slower, though","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:30:02.000Z","created_at_i":1788852602,"id":49606774,"options":[],"parent_id":49606757,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"People said this for Opus 4.6 too. Every release the models get RLHF'ed into accomplishing a new task and the people who need to do this task think there was a step change.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Lapel2742","children":[{"author":"nicce","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:31:07.000Z","created_at_i":1788856267,"id":49607349,"options":[],"parent_id":49606855,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":">> Fable was the step change for programming\n> AFAIK: Mistral does not even try to compete in this field.
They have released models speficially for programming that \u201dvibe coding\u201d would be safer.
https://mistral.ai/news/leanstral/","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:38:29.000Z","created_at_i":1788853109,"id":49606855,"options":[],"parent_id":49606757,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Fable was the step change for programming.
AFAIK: Mistral does not even try to compete in this field. There are other use cases for LLMs beside coding. As Mistral AI wrote:
> During the first wave of generative AI, the central question was who could build the most powerful model. Organizations and governments are now asking a different one: how to harness the power of AI for their mission-critical needs without surrendering control over the infrastructure and intelligence loop. Demand for that combination of performance with control, choice and independence is growing internationally, as enterprises and governments weigh the long-term technology dependencies, data governance requirements and deployment choices that come with any AI investment.
> Mistral is the only AI company in the world building the full stack required to answer that question: open-weight models, the infrastructure and the compute capacity they run on, and the products that bring them into production; ensuring that customers are never locked into a single vendor's roadmap, pricing or availability.
> Mistral\u2019s full-stack and open approach also allows organizations to build on it without exposing their most valuable data, workflows and institutional knowledge to anyone outside their own walls. That's what makes Mistral\u2019s stack the sovereign AI layer, meaning retaining control across four dimensions: data that stays inside the organization's boundaries, models that are controllable and customizable, compute that is private and predictable, and systems in production that are fully controllable and auditable.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"raverbashing","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:48:52.000Z","created_at_i":1788853732,"id":49606942,"options":[],"parent_id":49606757,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"If the choice is between Mistral and no AI, I'll take Mistral any day
Even those old llama models were ok for coding
Yes yes they won't be like Claude's fire and forget (until you see how many tokens you burned to write "Hello World")","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:28:10.000Z","created_at_i":1788852490,"id":49606757,"options":[],"parent_id":49606725,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It's not this week's change. Fable was the step change for programming. And most of truly useful and powerful capabilities arrived in the last eight months.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"piyush_patel_ha","children":[{"author":"antupis","children":[{"author":"nananana9","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:26:16.000Z","created_at_i":1788859576,"id":49607843,"options":[],"parent_id":49607545,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"When it comes to mundane bug fixes the value is in actually finding the cause of the bug, and I find SOTA models way outperform smaller ones here. I don't care about their output - I can write the correct 5 line patch myself once I understand what's wrong.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:55:18.000Z","created_at_i":1788857718,"id":49607545,"options":[],"parent_id":49607237,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yup, new SOTA models especially with high/xhigh/max reasoning too often overengineer solutions, good for benchmarks that usually measure task completion, bad for normal development where you don't want 'rewrite in rust and 1k LOC unit tests' style solutions when agent does mundane bug fixes.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:19:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788855573,"id":49607237,"options":[],"parent_id":49606725,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"A capability isn't binary. There is a massive difference between can produce an impressive demo and can reliably complete the task without a human babysitting it.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"guywithahat","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:29:54.000Z","created_at_i":1788888594,"id":49613526,"options":[],"parent_id":49606725,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"People fawn over AI brands now like cars and it's silly. OpenAI and Anthropic have been flipping spots for best LLM coder for the last two years and to say one is better feels silly; I've been using them both and they're very similar with different personalities. Recently Grok has become competitive in many aspects, and while I don't have much experience with Gemini it seems to come and go in terms of coding quality.
Saying only anthropic models are competitive frontier coding models is out of touch with the space imo","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:24:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788852298,"id":49606725,"options":[],"parent_id":49606611,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"People have been using LLMs for two year. It's not just this week's LLM release that is capable something.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"mdp2021","children":[{"author":"tripledry","children":[{"author":"mdp2021","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T15:46:08.000Z","created_at_i":1788968768,"id":49628462,"options":[],"parent_id":49607557,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Sorry for the delay.
It can be subjective, at this stage of product availability.
Personally, I hate to be frustrated by gross intellectual faults, so I did some research in the past about the best benchmarks to assess pure (simulated, apparent) intelligence. (The quality of the found benchmarks may not reflect what the models seem to do in practice, so one's experience should be compared to the raw numbers out of the benchmarks.) Good ideas emerge in the field: it was proposed and discussed on these very pages that the LLM should be able to solve "murder mysteries", for example (alongside the pattern recognition problems in which IQ tests consist, etc.).
Moreover, the LLM shall not delirate. It is an intrinsic issue with the current architectures (they do not mirror the "Foundational theory of Knowledge", which requires confidence values and relations of foundation between notions), but it is a problem with more or less presence per model. Artificial Analysis has introduced a metric for that.
Moreover again, I want an output style that works well for the purpose - must not be a clashing style like "youngspeak" ("like, awsome") or "paternalistspeak" ("when a planet likes another very much they are attracted...") or "sycophantspeak" ("your question is so deep and interesting") or "wetspeak" ("you can do it, feel this not that")... So, for example, I very much preferred Kimi k2 to gpt-oss-120b. I doubt there are benchmarks for this - "seriousspeak", "maturespeak" - but there should be.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:56:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788857793,"id":49607557,"options":[],"parent_id":49607076,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Genuinely interested, which ones do you think have relevance?
If I read forums and talk to people IRL most have differing opinions what model is best. Yes, for me it's pretty clear Opus is better than earlier models, but it's at least not obvious to me that the later are significant improvements.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:02:30.000Z","created_at_i":1788854550,"id":49607076,"options":[],"parent_id":49606611,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> don't care about benchmarks
You must care about good benchmarks (identify those that have relevance).","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:12:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788851540,"id":49606611,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I don't care about benchmarks. Benchmarks show that Opus 5 is a stronger model than Fable 5 which is obviously not the case.
But I do care about capability and so far only Anthropic and, very recently with Astra, OpenAI can deliver on coding quality. And capability matters immensely. There is a world of difference between being able to do something and not being able.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"tonyhart7","children":[{"author":"ahartmetz","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:29:48.000Z","created_at_i":1788852588,"id":49606771,"options":[],"parent_id":49606693,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The winning strategy seems to be actual capabilities plus cheating.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:20:50.000Z","created_at_i":1788852050,"id":49606693,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"are you saying current frontier AI labs is benchmaxxxing and not because the AI model is good ?????
You crazy to think that Fable and Astra capabilities is fake","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"TheJCDenton","children":[{"author":"InsideOutSanta","children":[{"author":"etiennebausson","children":[{"author":"andy99","children":[{"author":"barrenko","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:29:57.000Z","created_at_i":1788870597,"id":49609436,"options":[],"parent_id":49608982,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Not sure if you are European, but in EU it's a bit taboo to even talk about this in this manner. We like to spend a lot of money to make sure we finish last.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ben_w","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:31:29.000Z","created_at_i":1788870689,"id":49609461,"options":[],"parent_id":49608982,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"We know it's possible to put backdoors into LLMs, we don't have reliable ways to detect them without direct support from whoever inserted it.
Europe is less-worse-off with open weights than with\u2026 I guess it's weights-as-a-service? WaaS? The thing Anthropic and OpenAI do.
But that's not enough. As recently demonstrated, being just a few months behind with the power differential between defending with an open weight model while being attacked by a leading model, means losing absolutely.
I do not know if this holds going forward or not. It's not inconceivable that we're just about to get models that make unhackable code, using all the things software developers keep saying you need to do if you really care about security.
But anyone concerned about sovereignty can't bet the farm on this possibility. For the moment, it looks like it's a national security matter to ensure at least core state functionality (including core private sector logistics) gets the absolute best attention money can buy, and that the absolute best money can buy ("can buy" does a lot of heavy lifting here) is currently LLMs, and it's important those LLMs aren't going to get cut off by arbitrary whim like Mythos was, and it's important that those LLMs don't have backdoors like we can't rule out anyone else's from having.
This is true even if Europe was only defending from Russian cyberwarfare and didn't need to plan for the president of the country in which Mythos was developed, attempting to annex two NATO states.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"mhaberl","children":[{"author":"andy99","children":[{"author":"icantevenhold","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:34:57.000Z","created_at_i":1788888897,"id":49613621,"options":[],"parent_id":49610226,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yes it does. \nAccording to their official stats they have around 45M users of which ~500k are paying customers (of which 1000 are Enterprise customers)","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:40:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788874855,"id":49610226,"options":[],"parent_id":49609639,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Agree benchmarks don\u2019t tell the whole story. A better and easier evaluation of capability is whether anyone is using it for anything.
Does Mistral have material market share for any application, including anything that would fall under item 2 above?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:48:45.000Z","created_at_i":1788871725,"id":49609639,"options":[],"parent_id":49608982,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"2 things here, one is related to benchmaxxing, another to being good enough
1. Mistral isn't benchmaxxing. That doesn't mean they're better, but it does mean the benchmark gap not a good reflection of the actual gap
2. I think the "world class or nothing" framing mixes general capability with system capability. \nMost deployments don't need AGI\nIn RL you need a model that's reliably good at one or two things, thats it.\nExample: \nCase of a hospital flooded in emails.\nYou make a system that decides which patient emails needs a human and drafts replies for the rest. \nIf a sovereign model is good enough at that, and you can run it on a hospital's own servers under EU jurisdiction, the frontier gap part has zero importance
Who cares about "beats DeepSeek / GPT11 / Claude Fairytale 8.9"","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"simonask","children":[{"author":"celsoazevedo","children":[{"author":"lesuorac","children":[{"author":"celsoazevedo","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:30:38.000Z","created_at_i":1788888638,"id":49613539,"options":[],"parent_id":49613259,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Can I still get Google Adsense payments when Google has my European bank account and address if there are sanctions or something like that? Can I still login to my Cloudflare account and manage a domain registered with them? Will I lose access to Outlook or Gmail? Should I rely on Claude at all?
But the problem isn't if I can bypass sanctions, use VPNs, etc, or even if a company wants or can legally do that... it's the fact I'm asking these questions at all. It's not something I'd ask 15 years ago about US companies.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:12:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788887575,"id":49613259,"options":[],"parent_id":49610836,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The answer is yes.
You don't think Ukrainians can't buy stuff from Russia (and vice-versa)?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:28:24.000Z","created_at_i":1788877704,"id":49610836,"options":[],"parent_id":49609700,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Early this year I was thinking "will I still have access to this service if they invade Greenland?"
Never had to do it before. That's how much it has changed.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"phenomen","children":[{"author":"sofixa","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:39:57.000Z","created_at_i":1788881997,"id":49611949,"options":[],"parent_id":49611480,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It's a slow shift, but it's coming. For instance, Airbus already picked a French AWS replacement (Scaleway). It won't be all, it won't be tomorrow, but "what happens if we get tariffed / they invade Greenland" is already part of everyone's disaster planning.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"dpark","children":[{"author":"eternauta3k","children":[{"author":"dpark","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:35:04.000Z","created_at_i":1788888904,"id":49613626,"options":[],"parent_id":49612765,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They absolutely are. But this doesn\u2019t mean that they won\u2019t unwind those couplings. It just means it will be hard and take time.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:39:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788885595,"id":49612765,"options":[],"parent_id":49611983,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Aren't the supply chains hopelessly intercoupled in a million tiny ways? E.g. turbine blades being done by this single German company, x1000","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"simonask","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:39:27.000Z","created_at_i":1788892767,"id":49614747,"options":[],"parent_id":49611983,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Also, what lip service, exactly?
This is what I mean: Americans don\u2019t understand the immense dividends they have enjoyed from being the defacto symbol of \u201cprogress\u201d in the 20th and 21st centuries so far. American solutions were chosen by European customers because they were reliable trading partners with an air of modernity. Homegrown was seen as the antithesis to leapfrogging into the future.
People celebrated when McDonald\u2019s came to their country or town. Not anymore.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:42:45.000Z","created_at_i":1788882165,"id":49611983,"options":[],"parent_id":49611480,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The reality seems to be that for decades Europe gave only lip service to decoupling from American tech infrastructure, but in the last couple of years America has gone from being seen as a strong ally to being a major risk.
It will take time to move. Frankly as an American I hope it takes a long time and we get our shit together and rebuild our alliance with Europe. But it\u2019s possible that the damage is not reversible in the next couple of decades and Europe will accelerate their decoupling. It\u2019s also possible we continue to slide into imperialist authoritarianism (and Europe definitely accelerates their decoupling).","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"gbalduzzi","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:49:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788882598,"id":49612091,"options":[],"parent_id":49611480,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It doesn't happen overnight, but the adversarial behaviour of the current administration and the tariffs really changed the perspective about America on many Europeans.
The discussion about building European alternatives had never been so mainstream. If and once they emerge, I think the shift will happen. But let's see","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"simonask","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:47:19.000Z","created_at_i":1788893239,"id":49614883,"options":[],"parent_id":49611480,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"2 years is not a long time. What I\u2019m telling you is that sentiments have changed dramatically, and every government and company board across the continent is taking actions to position itself according to those sentiments.
You won\u2019t see the full effect of that for at least a decade, but that doesn\u2019t mean it\u2019s not happening.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"pagutierrezn","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T19:39:40.000Z","created_at_i":1788896380,"id":49615812,"options":[],"parent_id":49611480,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Weaponizing the dollar against Rusia first, and Iran now is damaging the world's confidence in the dollar-based monetary system beyond repair","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:09:37.000Z","created_at_i":1788880177,"id":49611480,"options":[],"parent_id":49609700,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"That's your fantasy. Reality is https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49607443","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"geodel","children":[{"author":"gbalduzzi","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:51:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788882718,"id":49612120,"options":[],"parent_id":49611705,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I think it is perfectly understood. \nBut we don't feel we are the ones that deteriorated the relationship, we are just reacting to it","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:24:13.000Z","created_at_i":1788881053,"id":49611705,"options":[],"parent_id":49609700,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"None of the European automotive company would be as profitable were it not the US market. I don't think Europeans are realizing that.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"stickfigure","children":[{"author":"celsoazevedo","children":[{"author":"stickfigure","children":[{"author":"celsoazevedo","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:43:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788889415,"id":49613797,"options":[],"parent_id":49613396,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Not to the same extent, but during his first term, his administration had issues with Canada, Mexico, Europe/UK, NATO, China, etc. Tariffs were a thing back then already. And he was elected again. Clearly it wasn't a huge issue for those who are bothered to go out and vote.
In any case, for everyone else, it's the second time in 10 years that they have to play the waiting game until it's over. It's good to be optimistic, but when you're in charge of a country, you can't just plan for the best and rely on hope alone. Same if you run a company or and even with services you as individual use.
Regarding memories, I don't know about the markets, but in Europe I think it will take a few years for everyone to forget that in 2026 Denmark had to transfer blood reserves to Greenland and that different European countries deployed tripwire forces because of... the US of A. Do you know who triggers similar responses? Russia, when they start saying that their borders are fluid.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"simonask","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:41:56.000Z","created_at_i":1788892916,"id":49614791,"options":[],"parent_id":49613396,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Hedging your country\u2019s future on American presidential approval numbers is political suicide in Europe, as it rightly should be.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:22:24.000Z","created_at_i":1788888144,"id":49613396,"options":[],"parent_id":49613089,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Even the people that voted for Trump didn't sign up for this, which is why his approval ratings are terrible even by historic standards. He didn't run on a platform of "attack Canada and suck up to Putin". Most Americans are very pro-European. Most of the voting population has living memory of the cold war.
As to what happens post-Trump, it's anyone's guess. I expect a hard reset. Markets have short memories, as they say.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:01:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788886866,"id":49613089,"options":[],"parent_id":49612962,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I'm not sure if it's really a "trump agenda". The ideas didn't start with him, the people who voted for said ideas aren't going to suddenly disappear, and this is his second term.
It looks more like part of the new normal from the outside, and that's why things are changing. A country can't go from reliable to unreliable partner every 4 years without any consequences.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"icantevenhold","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:32:17.000Z","created_at_i":1788888737,"id":49613566,"options":[],"parent_id":49612962,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yea I don\u2019t think this will blow over just because trump (might be?) is gone.
Frankly this already started under GW Bush from my perspective and just has gradually gotten worse.
I don\u2019t think you can unboil a frog that quickly. \nThis will take many years to resolve / build up trust again.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:53:07.000Z","created_at_i":1788886387,"id":49612962,"options":[],"parent_id":49609700,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> I don\u2019t think Americans are realizing yet how much has changed for us the past two years.
In two more, possibly less, the current administration will be gone. The Trump agenda will be dead in the water by the end of this year.
While I basically agree with you, I wonder how quickly people will forget.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:54:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788872062,"id":49609700,"options":[],"parent_id":49608982,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> In the event of some schism \u2026
In the views of most Europeans, that schism already happened.
Europe was perfectly happy to rely on US software and services for decades. None of the large US tech companies would be nearly as profitable if they hadn\u2019t had a whole continent of wealthy customers, and no competition.
I don\u2019t think Americans are realizing yet how much has changed for us the past two years.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"radicalbyte","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:23:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788873815,"id":49610019,"options":[],"parent_id":49608982,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The training data and knowledge is the edge, you need to build that up and maintain it. And of course mine everything you can from the American and Chinese models, like they mined everything from the internet / films / music / games etc.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"vrganj","children":[{"author":"andy99","children":[{"author":"vrganj","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:38:56.000Z","created_at_i":1788878336,"id":49610963,"options":[],"parent_id":49610627,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I think for coding tasks, it probably doesn't matter as much. I'm more worried about stuff like chatbots subtly pushing or normalizing a certain world view.
I think I'm not the only one that's had this revelation, recall the Llama4 announcement. [0]
> It\u2019s well-known that all leading LLMs have had issues with bias\u2014specifically, they historically have leaned left when it comes to debated political and social topics. This is due to the types of training data available on the internet.
> Our goal is to remove bias from our AI models
This goal of course is self-defeatingly impossible to achieve. There is no unbiased, there's always only an unbiased relative to the bias of the observer.
Phrased differently, models weren't right leaning enough for the American oligarchy class and they publicly shared their desire to change the ideology they perpetuate.
I think an important perspective to keep in mind here is Zizek, the philosopher who's dedicated his life's work to the functioning of ideology.
> I already am eating from the trashcan all the time. The name of this trashcan is ideology. The material force of ideology - makes me not see what I'm effectively eating. It's not only our reality which enslaves us. The tragedy of our predicament - when we are within ideology, is that - when we think that we escape it into our dreams - at that point we are within ideology.
-- Slavoj Zizek
My concern is that both the Americans and the Chinese will be aligning their models more and more ideologically and that they will function as the perfect propaganda machine - surface-level objective and unthreatening, but answering every question asked from a world view decided elsewhere.
For some tasks (like aforementioned coding), that won't matter and there we can use whatever model is most capable. But as we outsource more and more of our thinking to AI and use it more and more to educate impressionable young people, not having our own models will mean not getting a say in how societies views are shaped and perpetuated.
Imagine for example, the question: "What caused the French revolution?" There's many answers that might be technically correct. Which ones get emphasized is where ideology lives and gets perpetuated.
Since there is no unideological, the best we can do is a pluralism of ideologies building LLMs. To not build one representing your views is for your views to not be represented.
[0] https://ai.meta.com/blog/llama-4-multimodal-intelligence/","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:13:09.000Z","created_at_i":1788876789,"id":49610627,"options":[],"parent_id":49610424,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Is there a specific concern you have, and what kind of performance penalty is it worth to you on say coding tasks?
Conceptually, sure I understand, but in practice it currently seems like it amounts to just using a worse model without getting anything in return. And if some hypothetical alignment to European values is important, it seems like putting the necessary effort into building a model that\u2019s actually competitive but has this alignment is the solution, rather than accepting an inferior one.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:56:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788875815,"id":49610424,"options":[],"parent_id":49608982,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Any model, even an open weight one, is fundamentally an encoding of a way of viewing the world.
What kind of "alignment" are AI labs optimizing for? Ideological alignment is the full term, self-censored into something more technological-sounding.
Every model has people behind it rating what it should and shouldn't say. Every time you ask a model and trust its answer, you become ever-so-slightly ideologically indoctrinated.
I don't want my model to reflect the views of American oligarchs or Chinese cadres. I want European values of enlightenment and humanitarianism to be the default and that's why the sovereign part is important.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"rapind","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:24:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788877491,"id":49610777,"options":[],"parent_id":49608982,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"China's model for decades has been to do it cheaper and then do it better for cheaper. Just accepting this makes you an economic vassal state. We've seen this play out over decades now with other industries. I'm not blaming China for this approach, but if you want to stay relevant, then you need to compete.
You don't need to view China as some scary boogeyman who's going to use AI to attack you or w/e the current conspiracy is. They just need to continue peacefully outperforming while everyone else gets fat and lazy.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"miohtama","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:09:42.000Z","created_at_i":1788883782,"id":49612366,"options":[],"parent_id":49608982,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Chinese will stop giving models at some point","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:46:38.000Z","created_at_i":1788867998,"id":49608982,"options":[],"parent_id":49607654,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"What\u2019s the point of having \u201csovereign\u201d weights that are worse than publicly available ones? Wouldn\u2019t Europe be better off just keeping up-to-date on the Chinese releases? In the event of some schism requiring sovereign capability, or even if the Chinese pulled ahead and stopped releasing the weights, why would Europe be better off because of Mistral? (Or any country\u2019s inferior sovereign effort make them better off?)
I think I understand the incentives that cause this to exist (it would be politically worse to say we\u2019re just going to use Chinese models) but they are misguided. If sovereigns want to have valuable models, they should insist on world class, relevant ones like the Chinese have. Instead they embrace mediocrity in the name of sovereignty.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:05:45.000Z","created_at_i":1788858345,"id":49607654,"options":[],"parent_id":49606813,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral is a Sovereign LLM Company, it's their main product and has been from nearly the start.
They don't actually need to offer the best models, they need credibility on the tech front and the security/strategic front, and institutional clients will keep coming.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:33:59.000Z","created_at_i":1788852839,"id":49606813,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> When Apple is not racing for the frontier it's a strategy, but when it's Mistral it's a mistake.
I think what Mistral is doing is smart within their financial constraints, but this comparison is misleading. Mistral is an LLM company; Apple is a consumer hardware and services company.
It's smart for Apple not to join the LLM arms race, because they can just pick the cheapest supplier and let other companies take the financial losses. Mistral is in a very different situation; they are the supplier.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"riffraff","children":[{"author":"moffkalast","children":[{"author":"rapind","children":[{"author":"moffkalast","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:37:26.000Z","created_at_i":1788892646,"id":49614710,"options":[],"parent_id":49610577,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I don't think any Mistral model can match an open 30B-sized Qwen from a year ago, so right now they're not really a competitive alternative to anything at all. Except Voxtral perhaps, but that's very niche.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:09:19.000Z","created_at_i":1788876559,"id":49610577,"options":[],"parent_id":49607447,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I think the route to profitability is super clear and simple. To be a reasonable alternative to Chinese and US models.
I think you're probably better off using the Chinese open models right now if you're concerned about vendor lock-in or capabilities disappearing because someone's economy seems a bit fragile atm. There's no guarantee China keeps releasing open weights though, so supporting a pragmatic alternative isn't a horrible idea.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:43:30.000Z","created_at_i":1788857010,"id":49607447,"options":[],"parent_id":49606827,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Well the only place they were ever able to compete with are open models, which is by definition completely unprofitable (unless they also want to compete with Vast or Openrouter as hosting for their models or something), so that sort of makes sense from the business side of things?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"madeofpalk","children":[{"author":"leoc","children":[{"author":"mandeepj","children":[{"author":"jamiejquinn","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:21:01.000Z","created_at_i":1788891661,"id":49614474,"options":[],"parent_id":49613532,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Why?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Danox","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T03:28:42.000Z","created_at_i":1788924522,"id":49620542,"options":[],"parent_id":49613532,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Whatever they do will take 2 to 4 years and I think they will do something to permanently solve their memory problem and I think it will be no different than solving their processor problem (Intel) or their long-term modem problem (Qualcomm).
Let Google spend $185 billion, and Microsoft spend $140 billion thru the end of this year on AI model building and AI hardware.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:30:17.000Z","created_at_i":1788888617,"id":49613532,"options":[],"parent_id":49609426,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Apple is probably also waiting
they could seriously do something about it instead of waiting.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:29:10.000Z","created_at_i":1788870550,"id":49609426,"options":[],"parent_id":49607847,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Apple is probably also waiting for increased RAM supply to start making high-quality local inference a viable mainstream option.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Grombobulous","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:47:02.000Z","created_at_i":1788893222,"id":49614875,"options":[],"parent_id":49607847,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Is that really part of Apple\u2019s strategy? They have recent examples of moving a whole bunch of stuff that requires a lot of research in-house. You\u2019ve got stuff like their silicon, cellular modems, Vision Pro, the health business, etc.
Really Apple is pretty R&D heavy when it comes to their hardware business.
I think it\u2019s more accurate to say that Apple sees itself as a consumer solutions provider first while a lot of the companies in the AI race are heavily focused on B2B.
The frontier AI model race is about being the first to be able to sell solutions to companies that will replace their workers and make their workers more productive.
But for B2C, the value potential just isn\u2019t there, which is why Apple isn\u2019t chasing it.
And now you\u2019ve got the Mac mini/Mac Studio situation where Apple is better off selling pickaxes.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:26:25.000Z","created_at_i":1788859585,"id":49607847,"options":[],"parent_id":49606827,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The other part of Apple's strategy is "lets not waste money doing all that expensive research - lets just pay them for the finished result and save money".","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"samtheprogram","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:16:54.000Z","created_at_i":1788877014,"id":49610680,"options":[],"parent_id":49606827,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> go after profitable niches and avoid unwinnable fights
If you know Apple's history, this should stand out to you.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"buran77","children":[{"author":"alberto467","children":[{"author":"lores","children":[{"author":"gboss","children":[{"author":"sznio","children":[{"author":"gboss","children":[{"author":"inemesitaffia","children":[{"author":"fulafel","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-12T08:53:22.000Z","created_at_i":1789203202,"id":49670395,"options":[],"parent_id":49670328,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Population-weighted, the country is more European (80% of pop on Europe side).\nThat 80% counts towards population of Europe.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-12T08:39:16.000Z","created_at_i":1789202356,"id":49670328,"options":[],"parent_id":49632406,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Does that include Russia, the Asian country with a European Capital?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"p91paul","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-12T18:52:46.000Z","created_at_i":1789239166,"id":49675833,"options":[],"parent_id":49632406,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"EU != Europe...
According to wikipedia, EU has a 23 trillion GDP (30 trillion PPP) and 451 million people, making ~51k GDP per person (67k PPP).\nUS is at 32 trillion GDP and same PPP for 342 million people - 94k per person","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-09T19:10:00.000Z","created_at_i":1788981000,"id":49632406,"options":[],"parent_id":49621848,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Wikipedia says 745 million\u2026 that can\u2019t be right\nhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe
So even worse","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-09T06:11:24.000Z","created_at_i":1788934284,"id":49621848,"options":[],"parent_id":49620021,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"just barely over a 100M more","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-09T02:21:52.000Z","created_at_i":1788920512,"id":49620021,"options":[],"parent_id":49617345,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Europe does have 150-200 million more people right?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"illiac786","children":[{"author":"lores","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T09:02:09.000Z","created_at_i":1788944529,"id":49623471,"options":[],"parent_id":49620732,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"PPP the EU is also about 30 trillions, which is probably the better measure since we're comparing production for domestic purposes.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-09T03:56:00.000Z","created_at_i":1788926160,"id":49620732,"options":[],"parent_id":49617345,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Ah, interesting I always thought USA\u2019s GDP far ahead, but it\u2019s not. Compared to EU it\u2019s 20 vs. 30 trillions/y. Adding Switzerland, UK, etc. and it\u2019s close.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T21:29:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788902975,"id":49617345,"options":[],"parent_id":49616802,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Or it would be gone. Or it would be in the hands of psychopaths. Europe trades off the extremes for a better middle. It doesn't produce quite as many big names, but US and EU economies are roughly the same size.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T20:48:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788900531,"id":49616802,"options":[],"parent_id":49610818,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"There are a bunch of Europeans working in the top labs abroad. We do not lack any know how, we only lack the raw amount of capital invested in doing private research, since our companies cannot thrive and compete globally due to regulations. Mistral would be much bigger if it was founded in the US.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:27:19.000Z","created_at_i":1788877639,"id":49610818,"options":[],"parent_id":49606827,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral is doing one more thing: building up local know-how in the European ecosystem. This is worth more than money, you can't bootstrap an industry overnight.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"deterministic","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-11T01:13:10.000Z","created_at_i":1789089190,"id":49652323,"options":[],"parent_id":49606827,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> "go after profitable niches and avoid unwinnable fights"
Straight out of "The Art of War" by Sun Tzu.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:35:34.000Z","created_at_i":1788852934,"id":49606827,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I am not sure it's correct to lump apple and Mistral's strategies together. Apple's business is selling hardware/services and their stores, but Mistral's business is AI.
Apple's strategy seems to be "wait till real business shakes out" but Mistral's strategy seems to be "go after profitable niches and avoid unwinnable fights".","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ywvcbk","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:51:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788853911,"id":49606966,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Apple is in an entirely different market than Mistral (consumer electronics vs AI lab focusing on enterprise consulting). Which obviously means their optimal strategies are different. It doesn't really matter for Apple if it's Gemini or other model running behind their AI features. If anything it saves them a lot of money and provides a lot of flexibility.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"pembrook","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:55:57.000Z","created_at_i":1788854157,"id":49607003,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yea people tend to give Apple the benefit of the doubt because they\u2019re the most successful and valuable company in human history.
Mistral is not Apple, and is not emulating their strategy. Please show me Mistral\u2019s half a $Trillion in yearly revenue coming from consumer hardware/software.
Then I\u2019ll agree with you that they\u2019re taking the Apple strategy.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"TacticalCoder","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:09:13.000Z","created_at_i":1788854953,"id":49607154,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> When Apple is not racing for the frontier it's a strategy, but when it's Mistral it's a mistake.
Apple is a $4.7 trillion company selling computers and iPhones. How many computers and iPhones is Mistral selling?
In your comparison Apple is Apple while Mistral is orange.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"hkt","children":[{"author":"philipallstar","children":[{"author":"toyg","children":[{"author":"philipallstar","children":[{"author":"noir_lord","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:53:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788857615,"id":49607522,"options":[],"parent_id":49607424,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"If they get to "good enough is good enough" and are sovereign to the EU, that is a market fit/moat that's hard to crack since the distinguishing criteria is both parts.
It's hard for a US company to be sovereign to the EU and the same with China ;).
Given current geopolitics there are going to be a lot of quiet conversations in government offices across Europe about how much we want to rely on the Americans/Chinese for anything and how we reduce that exposure to either.
Yes we have and will have the entrenched problem to deal with but adding to that problem is the issue at this point.
When this comes up on HN quite frequently the comments are.. interesting - there seems to be a kneejerk "How dare the Europeans consider their alternatives/not using us (where us is the US)", they take it personally that lots of techies/governments in the EU are trying to find ways to avoid making the dependence we have any worse than it already is but that's frankly getting annoyed at the wrong people, maybe get annoyed at the people who are making us question if the current cosy (for the US) situation is what we want.
For some of us this has been expected for a long while and just defacto handing over/not competing with the US on the tech side never really sat right to start with, it was and is always a risk to hand that kind of power to another country/entity.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:40:37.000Z","created_at_i":1788856837,"id":49607424,"options":[],"parent_id":49607346,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"True - fair enough. Perhaps a little uncharitable. I would still currently say that the Mistral AI is more like a worse cellphone in every sense that has the right supplier agreements, but perhaps there are subtleties I'm missing.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:30:59.000Z","created_at_i":1788856259,"id":49607346,"options":[],"parent_id":49607244,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"That's uncharitable. Defense companies do play the game (like anyone in the enterprise space), but they also do ship stuff that is uniquely set up to satisfy the use-case. I don't think an unmodified iPhone would do great in a warzone with no cell signal.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:20:13.000Z","created_at_i":1788855613,"id":49607244,"options":[],"parent_id":49607195,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They aren't following the same strategy. Apple does race for the frontier in their main field: beautiful, well-integrated hardware and software. Mistral does not race for the frontier in their main field: AI creation. They're grabbing bits and bobs from people that need (or feel they need) sovereign AI. It's like if you go into making phones for the military. You aren't going for the best phones; you're going for making sure you're the only company that has the right connections to keep that customer.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:14:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788855298,"id":49607195,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I am baffled by the responses to this, not seeing that a similar strategy can be applied in a different field.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ulfw","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:28:36.000Z","created_at_i":1788856116,"id":49607317,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"AI company not keeping up with AI companies is by no definition the same as combinedhardwaresoftwareservicesentertainmentlifestyletechcompany not keeping up with AI companies","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"niltecedu","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:34:41.000Z","created_at_i":1788856481,"id":49607376,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"One is a AI company first, the other has tons of other services and they can just buy those outright.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"TheJCDenton","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:05:21.000Z","created_at_i":1788858321,"id":49607647,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They are not the same kind of companies but they benefit both in their own way of the same market reading.
Apple is fine-tunning Gemini to customize Siri for their customers. They improve what's between the model and their customers : fine tune, inference up to the product. This is exactly what Mistral is doing, with an even more diversity of usage and needs because they are business oriented, instead of customer oriented. This is also what make them economically very efficient in comparison.
Beside Apple is still doing science experiments while Mistral is capable of releasing commercial models, albeit small and specialized.
Don't get me wrong, it's absolutely obvious that Apple is incredibly powerful, now more than ever. But the way they see the future, Mistral have a leaner trajectory.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"elAhmo","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:08:21.000Z","created_at_i":1788858501,"id":49607670,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Apple is a hardware company.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ACCount37","children":[{"author":"dbspin","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:58:25.000Z","created_at_i":1788875905,"id":49610446,"options":[],"parent_id":49607892,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They're enormously risk averse, and realised the infrastructure (and perhaps more important external dependency cost of building out their own training data centres). Now that the utility of the technology is clearer, and OpenAI amongst others have proven it's not only Nvidia and Google that can build a stack capable of training frontier models - I think we may find that the beast waketh from slumber.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:32:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788859926,"id":49607892,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Apple tried at AI integration and fumbled the bag repeatedly.
In 2010s, they were among the "greats" of consumer AI. After 2022, they kept trying, and just had delays and underperformance. I don't think their actions now are "strategy" and not "skill issue".","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"WhereIsTheTruth","children":[{"author":"PunchyHamster","children":[{"author":"alephnan","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:56:17.000Z","created_at_i":1788868577,"id":49609091,"options":[],"parent_id":49608929,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Well Microsoft\u2019s PR machine is working overtime then because I wasn\u2019t even aware of Microsoft doing this until this HN thread whereas Sony was everywhere on social media","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"WhereIsTheTruth","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:40:44.000Z","created_at_i":1788882044,"id":49611955,"options":[],"parent_id":49608929,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"You are conflating two separate events:
-2013 DRM/always online drama (reversed pre launch)
-2023 shutdown of its physical release division, which is what triggered shift to digital only titles we are seeing now
Different year, different mechanism, different reception and different press coverage","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:41:43.000Z","created_at_i":1788867703,"id":49608929,"options":[],"parent_id":49607894,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> When Microsoft is killing physical in 2023 to push for Gamepass and digital only, it's labeled as "progress and infrastructure planning", when it's Sony that does it, it's labeled as "greed and anti consumerism"
Microsoft got massive pushback when they did it, Sony even made ad making fun of it. Selective memory much ?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:32:09.000Z","created_at_i":1788859929,"id":49607894,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"One is american, the other is european
It's the same with gaming
When Microsoft is killing physical in 2023 to push for Gamepass and digital only, it's labeled as "progress and infrastructure planning", when it's Sony that does it, it's labeled as "greed and anti consumerism"
Hopefully more people get attentive to how the industry & the media works, and how US Big Tech manages to kill any form of alternative","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"wraptile","children":[{"author":"ta20240528","children":[{"author":"wraptile","children":[{"author":"ta20240528","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:30:31.000Z","created_at_i":1788863431,"id":49608361,"options":[],"parent_id":49608172,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The wording of the CLOUD act prevents any American company from competing, but yes, other European-only companies could offer the same.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:07:37.000Z","created_at_i":1788862057,"id":49608172,"options":[],"parent_id":49608139,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Do they actually own it though? AFAIK they have no significant moat even in the EU (legal or competitive) and given the current accessibility to non-SOTA AI (open weight models and distillation) it's just a matter of time until Mistral gets serious competition on these points.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:02:26.000Z","created_at_i":1788861746,"id":49608139,"options":[],"parent_id":49607919,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":""What does Mistral own?"
Independence from the USA's CLOUD Act, secret FISA courts, and ICC-style disabling of important services.*
*\u2026and the Chinese equivalents.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"jackgavigan","children":[{"author":"MSKJ","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T20:55:18.000Z","created_at_i":1788900918,"id":49616888,"options":[],"parent_id":49609374,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"New product idea: AI coat. For only 20M tokens it will tell you the optimal number of buttons to button up*
*Please verify results with human based weather perception","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:24:36.000Z","created_at_i":1788870276,"id":49609374,"options":[],"parent_id":49607919,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> ..but you're comparing apples to oranges.
Actually, he\u2019s comparing apples to mistrals.
I\u2019ll get my coat.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"vasco","children":[{"author":"wraptile","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:47:30.000Z","created_at_i":1788889650,"id":49613862,"options":[],"parent_id":49609886,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"yes, you don't own your iphone by every defition other than holding the brick in your hand.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:11:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788873080,"id":49609886,"options":[],"parent_id":49607919,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Here I was thinking Apple sold phones and you're saying they rent them out?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:35:08.000Z","created_at_i":1788860108,"id":49607919,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Apple _owns_ computers in people's pockets. There are very few businesses that can match this value. What does Mistral own? A head start at best. For the record I like Mistral and hope they succeed, but you're comparing apples to oranges.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"serbuvlad","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:40:10.000Z","created_at_i":1788864010,"id":49608437,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Apple and Mistral are not in the same market.
Siri is a minor part of the Apple ecosystem. Fundamentally, it can call into a better LLM provided by a better company. Siri's only utility is that it has access to your iData and can control your iDevices.
Apple sells devices. They have benefited a lot from their devices being good (Apple Silicon).
Mistral sells LLMs. They would benefit from having good LLMs.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"PunchyHamster","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:32:59.000Z","created_at_i":1788867179,"id":49608855,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Apple is not "racing", Apple is just paying other companies for service of LLM.
Which is smart move","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"r_lee","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:01:21.000Z","created_at_i":1788868881,"id":49609147,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Apple is not an AI company, Mistral is. it's not really a fair comparison","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"whywhywhywhy","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:05:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788869122,"id":49609183,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It's a mistake when Apple does it too, they're back in the same situation they were with Google Maps in the early iPhone days.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"r4rf","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:12:09.000Z","created_at_i":1788869529,"id":49609252,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Lmao imagine saying Mistral and Apple are in the same position.. wtf.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"radicalbyte","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:22:16.000Z","created_at_i":1788873736,"id":49610003,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Specifically we have American models which were built on extremely crappy data in insane quantities. What happens when you use same models to build a corpus of extremely high quality training data. Say for Math, coding etc. Then use that to train models. Can you get the same performance from models 10% of the size? Or 1%? Or 0.01%?
From what I've been seeing we're clearly getting to a position where models are getting "good enough" for some tasks to be really cool assistants to skilled people. And they're limited more by being extremely slow and expensive to run. What happens when they're not?
I can't see the model providers winning enough to make their valuations real.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ignoramous","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:14:07.000Z","created_at_i":1788891247,"id":49614341,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> When Apple is not racing for the frontier it's a strategy, but when it's Mistral it's a mistake.
Also: When China does it, it is protectionism; when Europe does it, it is sovereignty.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"wiseowise","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T05:14:42.000Z","created_at_i":1788930882,"id":49621344,"options":[],"parent_id":49606733,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> When Apple is not racing for the frontier it's a strategy, but when it's Mistral it's a mistake.
Ah, yes, it is really baffling that Mistral, a new European AI startup, is held to a different standard compared to a unique, 50 year old, software + hardware, 4.5 TRILLION dollar market cap company. A truly mystery of our times.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:26:02.000Z","created_at_i":1788852362,"id":49606733,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"When Apple is not racing for the frontier it's a strategy, but when it's Mistral it's a mistake.
The two companies have read the market the same.
It's always very dangerous for first movers and their investors, and the commodification of intelligence seems even more likely each time a chinese open model release. It's less exciting to do business that way, but if you're building to stand the test of time, it's wiser that way.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"catoc","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:30:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788852606,"id":49606775,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"With how they\u2019re currently being used we might as well call them bendmarks.
Every newly released model is paraded as SOTA showing peak or near peak performance on cherry-picked bendmarks the model was either fine-tuned on, or tested under specific conditions optimal for that model.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ywvcbk","children":[{"author":"jillesvangurp","children":[{"author":"alansaber","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:45:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788864333,"id":49608488,"options":[],"parent_id":49607219,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":""something that will work reliably and predictably for years" is not really the class of product being sold, unless you're using a fine-tuned SLM to do something like classification. The vast majority of work being done with AI unfortunately benefits from being run on the biggest/best model.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ywvcbk","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T06:30:59.000Z","created_at_i":1788935459,"id":49622031,"options":[],"parent_id":49607219,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> The big US based hyper-scalers are neither liked nor trusted here at this point
I'm not sure that's true amongst most large enterprise companies.
> They could make a lot of money in the EU if they do a decent enough job
They could but unfortunately there have only ever been a small handful of European tech companies which got anywhere close to that","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:17:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788855453,"id":49607219,"options":[],"parent_id":49606925,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"There are two separate issues here. One of which is very simple. That issue is where to run the models. For many companies this has to be in the EU, on EU terms. Mostly, this is not really optional from a compliance point of view. It's why all the big cloud providers have data centers in places like Frankfurt, Amsterdam, etc. and why a lot of new data centers are being built in Ireland. Of course a lot of those investments are being made by US companies. But they all have legal entities in the EU because otherwise they'd have no business here. And they can't afford to miss out on that business because it's a huge market.
The second one is about which model to run and who controls and oversees quality control. OpenAI and Anthropic seem to insist that only they can do that. But of course here in the EU we see that a bit differently. The big US based hyper-scalers are neither liked nor trusted here at this point. We don't trust the Chinese model makers much either. But with open weight models, we can at least pick different models and run them on our own terms.
Also, what most companies need is not necessarily the latest fashionable model straight from the Silicon Valley cat walk but something that will work reliably and predictably for years. Factories are not going to install the latest model in their production lines every few weeks. Same with most banks, insurers, etc. I actually know people that do business with those in relation to AI development in Germany. Companies like that are very much obsessing about self hosting their models. Sending customer data off premises is a big concern for them. They are building stuff that will be used for many years. In five years, nobody will care which model was best in autumn of 2026. But a lot of software built this year that uses AI might still be running.
You have to see Mistral's investment in that context. They could make a lot of money in the EU if they do a decent enough job. Lots of conservative companies here that are going to pick something that's good enough and then they'll be using that for many years.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"halJordan","children":[{"author":"ywvcbk","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T06:30:15.000Z","created_at_i":1788935415,"id":49622022,"options":[],"parent_id":49619508,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Which indicates they are no longer serious about being an AI lab and downgraded themselves to merely being a hosting provider","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-09T01:20:01.000Z","created_at_i":1788916801,"id":49619508,"options":[],"parent_id":49606925,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Have you checked their api page recently? They're big model is .... glm 5.3 (or one or whatever dot releases)","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:46:16.000Z","created_at_i":1788853576,"id":49606925,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Realistically they will have to deploy the Chinese models or their finetuned versions though since their models are completely out of date and not competitive. Outside of maybe government contracts it will be hard to compete against Azure/AWS who promise to run their models in EU datacenters and not store any data since actual companies normally prefer frontier models with decent performance (cost/performance is pretty decent as well if you are fine with e.g. Luna which is massively better than anything Mistral can offer).","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"gvieri","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:47:47.000Z","created_at_i":1788853667,"id":49606936,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I tried them via OpenRouter. I loved their OCR. I really disliked their code generation. It was about six months ago -- so it was a geological era ago in this world. However Mistral is legally favored in Europe. In fact from my point of view , using them presents no trouble with GDPR (I live and work in Europe). I'm NOT a lawyer but I'm a technician that define itself 'privacy savy'.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"dzonga","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:48:57.000Z","created_at_i":1788853737,"id":49606944,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I also think their business model is interesting in that they can also serve Chinese models e.g GLM and fine tune them for enterprises.
which is a market Chinese labs won't get into.
they only other company they compete with is probably palantir in that regard.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"mokre","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:09:52.000Z","created_at_i":1788854992,"id":49607158,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"How you know that they are not realy benchmaxxxing? Maybe they just have skill issue in this olimpics.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"bsoqk","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:43:44.000Z","created_at_i":1788857024,"id":49607449,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":">They're also landing big customers in Europe for the right reasons.
We've been migrating all of our AI automations from Gemini to Mistral because of the fear of data transfer regulations. Maybe they don't apply to us (we don't really feed personal data to AI), but we can't afford to find out.
It's been quite annoying too because the Mistral documentation and dashboards are all over the place.
Fear of fines... that's not what I would call "the right reasons".","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Bayart","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:58:21.000Z","created_at_i":1788857901,"id":49607577,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral doesn't look like it's benching at all. They're just as well funded as a lot of Chinese labs doing much more interesting work R&D-wise.\nTailoring products for compliance doesn't cut it IMO, but I'm not in their shoes.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Eldodi","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:13:48.000Z","created_at_i":1788858828,"id":49607716,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Is it really contrarian though? Cohere, Aleph Alpha and many other model companies went that route and are doing well","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"jatins","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:14:34.000Z","created_at_i":1788862474,"id":49608240,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> clearly have a contrarian business strategy to the other AI labs
What\u2019s contrarian? Dont they also sell API and subscription like every other lab?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"redox99","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:21:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788866515,"id":49608763,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral models are way worse than Chinese models in the real world. It's not benchmarks.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"smurf9852","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:24:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788866695,"id":49608783,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I want an intelligent model, which Mistral does not have.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"msh","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:32:07.000Z","created_at_i":1788867127,"id":49608843,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I am European and would like European AI so I tried mistral this month.
Their own models seems like years old OpenAI models, hallucinations all over the place and coding was crazy slow.
I can only say two good things about them:
- their hosted glm model was fast\n- because I canceled within 14 days they gave me a full refund.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"blackcat201","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:35:52.000Z","created_at_i":1788867352,"id":49608881,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"who says they aren't benchmaxxing?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ur-whale","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:13:26.000Z","created_at_i":1788869606,"id":49609262,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> they clearly have a contrarian business strategy to the other AI labs.
Yeah, spot on.
I'd add they are also betting on building specialized AI's targeting narrow yet very profitable segment markets, where general AI's \u00e0 la AnthroOpenAI don't work very well.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"tomaskafka","children":[{"author":"make3","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:30:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788870606,"id":49609438,"options":[],"parent_id":49609360,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Then your choice is either a US mega corp under the Trump partial dictatorship shitshow or a Chinese model distillation factory that could turn on you at any second.
I understand that there are users that would prefer another option, especially in the EU.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:23:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788870202,"id":49609360,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"As a potential user, I want a competent model (the definition is shifting as the SOTA improves), but Mistral doesn\u2019t seem to be that.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"HNIsAds","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:54:40.000Z","created_at_i":1788872080,"id":49609701,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> People dump on them because
Because this forum is sponsored by Claude and Anslopic.
Anything against the narrative is attacked.
Used mistral 7b locally for years - it\u2019s fine.
Their web version is like a slightly worse Gemini - also fine","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"websap","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:07:47.000Z","created_at_i":1788872867,"id":49609853,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Sounds more like regulatory capture, than building state of art sovereign models.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"maxdo","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:26:44.000Z","created_at_i":1788884804,"id":49612574,"options":[],"parent_id":49606330,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"So they are parasites on sovereign blah blah blah.
And yes , Chinese models will be cheaper compared to what they offer , as well as American models will be much smarter polished . This is the only market they have , lobby sovereignty among politicians.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:38:26.000Z","created_at_i":1788849506,"id":49606330,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral is an interesting AI company because they clearly have a contrarian business strategy to the other AI labs. They're also landing big customers in Europe for the right reasons. People dump on them because they're not benchmaxxxing which is pretty shortsighted - do you really want to be in a benchmark arms race with China, or do you want to make money and deploy sovereign AI compute in Europe?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"cl-coder","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:39:12.000Z","created_at_i":1788849552,"id":49606337,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"So I suppose mistral-large-4 then in a few months?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"AidenVennis","children":[{"author":"Traubenfuchs","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:55:34.000Z","created_at_i":1788850534,"id":49606484,"options":[],"parent_id":49606379,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> but have a good EU alternative to Opus or even Sonnet
They would if they could, which means they can\u2018t, even though they want to.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:44:38.000Z","created_at_i":1788849878,"id":49606379,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I really do hope they can catch up with the American models, but I think setting the Chinese models as the goal would be best. They seems to be able to create great models with low cost that are probably useful for 90% of the day to day tasks. Mistral should not focus on competing with Claude Fable or OpenAI's Astra at first but have a good EU alternative to Opus or even Sonnet. The fact that it's European will be enough to be used by a lot of companies and governments in the EU that are (trying to) move away from US tech.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"shevy-java","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:46:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788849982,"id":49606396,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They are all responsible for driving up RAM prices.
I want my money back.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ph4rsikal","children":[{"author":"BenoitP","children":[{"author":"eloisant","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:14:25.000Z","created_at_i":1788851665,"id":49606631,"options":[],"parent_id":49606605,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Local models or independent hosting companies. Like Baseten, but there could be dozens of them.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"dist-epoch","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:51:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788853911,"id":49606967,"options":[],"parent_id":49606605,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"if you have a computer to run said local GLM models one","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:10:21.000Z","created_at_i":1788851421,"id":49606605,"options":[],"parent_id":49606440,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"And GLM local models can eat Anthropic's lunch just like both eat OpenAI's.
Mistral's revenue is mostly B2B, and that's much more difficult to move.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"antupis","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:14:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788851675,"id":49606632,"options":[],"parent_id":49606440,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral just needs to good enough category think all those flash models or Qwen3.8 27b which they sadly aren't at the moment, that plus being European lab will mean that they will have very nice business. Even now these SOTA models feel too overkill for most tasks.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"alansaber","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:49:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788864560,"id":49608517,"options":[],"parent_id":49606440,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The question is not, will mistral be able to create the best models (seems bloody unlikely). The question is, will mistral have enough expertise to dominate its business use-case, which is the model infra/deployment market within the EU (which is more plausible, with even a 3rd, 4th, 5th best model development team).","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"tensor","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:22:23.000Z","created_at_i":1788884543,"id":49612519,"options":[],"parent_id":49606440,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The big US labs are naively hoping that compute power will always be their moat. I strongly suspect they are dead wrong, and newer architectures will require vastly less training data and outperform the brute force approach of US labs.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:50:45.000Z","created_at_i":1788850245,"id":49606440,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral's annual revenue (700M) is what Anthropic generates in 3 days.\nIt will be extremely difficult to build new models with these numbers.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"nalekberov","children":[{"author":"philipwhiuk","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:27:34.000Z","created_at_i":1788874054,"id":49610071,"options":[],"parent_id":49606441,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The US invested billions to ensure sovereign launch capability. Seems to have paid off.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:50:45.000Z","created_at_i":1788850245,"id":49606441,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":""Mistral raises \u20ac3B to make sovereign, open-weight AI the technology frontier". Oh yeah, that sounds reasonable, indeed, one receives this much money just for sovereignty's sake.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"tasoeur","children":[{"author":"kome","children":[{"author":"tasoeur","children":[{"author":"Towaway69","children":[{"author":"clarionbell","children":[{"author":"Towaway69","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:02:56.000Z","created_at_i":1788868976,"id":49609160,"options":[],"parent_id":49607601,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> unclear immigration status, had their funding cut off, or don't care about money.
Ah ok, thanks for the clarification. I thought this would be more to do with politics.
So we\u2019ll end up with ex-US folks starting up those European companies that decouple Europe from US tech! (Thats tongue in cheek.)","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:01:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788858080,"id":49607601,"options":[],"parent_id":49606586,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Sort of yes. But it's nowhere near as much as some would like to believe. It mostly concerns those who have unclear immigration status, had their funding cut off, or don't care about money.
Now, that is quite a lot of people. But not nearly enough to reverse decades of brain drain.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:07:52.000Z","created_at_i":1788851272,"id":49606586,"options":[],"parent_id":49606534,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> researchers may be looking for greener pastures.
Is that still a thing? Or have those would leave have left, after all, it's been ~6 years of Trump already.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:00:39.000Z","created_at_i":1788850839,"id":49606534,"options":[],"parent_id":49606510,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I actually live in Paris and get your point, but at some point you have to face the reality of the market/industry and really try your best to get good folks to join, especially in the current climate where US researchers may be looking for greener pastures.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"mciancia","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:14:40.000Z","created_at_i":1788851680,"id":49606633,"options":[],"parent_id":49606510,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"But you should be able to hire most of the people you want, not just some that happen to pick Paris.
Also, if given a choice of 90k eur in Paris vs let's say 2m usd in US I'm pretty sure suddenly most of the issues people have with US would suddenly disappear ;)","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"eloisant","children":[{"author":"jongjong","children":[{"author":"Bayart","children":[{"author":"bad_login","children":[{"author":"jongjong","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-10T02:22:31.000Z","created_at_i":1789006951,"id":49637574,"options":[],"parent_id":49609210,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"In Australia, house would be at least 50% more, apartment would be maybe 70% more. Beef is cheaper (about half price) and tastier (from my experience). Bread is probably half price and way tastier in France though.
Actually, after living in Europe and coming back to Australia, the quality and price of meat is what surprised me most. A lot of times in Europe, I would order a burger and the patty would basically taste like sausage meat; tough and flavorless. In Australia, beef is really good and cheap.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:07:56.000Z","created_at_i":1788869276,"id":49609210,"options":[],"parent_id":49607541,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I will break don't my past salary in france to give people a better idea.
2200\u20ac in my pocket each month with health care and taxes paid.
My yearly gross salary 39_000\u20ac.\nMy yearly super-gross salary (what the company actually pay) 54_000\u20ac.
Actually the company paid less due to CIR (https://entreprendre.service-public.gouv.fr/vosdroits/F23533) I don't the number but at absolute minimum the company could have paid 31_320\u20ac.
I live in the south east of france not in a big city and I have 13 years of xp.
And to compare to the cost of life :
- 200g of bread is 1\u20ac.\n - tomato 4\u20ac/kg\n - beef 27-40\u20ac/kg\n - 100m2 individual house 350_000\u20ac\n - 60m2 flat 150_000\u20acSalaries are calculated differently in France, Germany, US etc. For example working in Germany you're likely to fork a huge amount monthly to your health insurance. It actually makes it difficult to negotiate comp across borders.
$55k USD brut in France is around 2.8k EUR / month after taxes in France, which counts as the upper bracket of Middle Class in most of the country outside of Paris. Paltry when you're used to tech comps but decent for the vast majority of people here.
On the whole I agree that it's not competitive regionally or globally, and as for myself I'd leave for Switzerland or Australia if I had the opportunity.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"gib444","children":[{"author":"jongjong","children":[{"author":"44ff","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:08:15.000Z","created_at_i":1788887295,"id":49613192,"options":[],"parent_id":49611940,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Youre 100% spot on.
Britain is its own worst enemy. I'm convinced if there was a movement to destroy the intangible class-system the economy would grow big time. The lack of investment comes from old-farts getting away with lack of reinvestment due to a lack of competition - and nobody talks about it.
The 'intangible class-system' is what you felt.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:39:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788881973,"id":49611940,"options":[],"parent_id":49607918,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"My wife and I love British culture, architecture, parks, etc... But compared to Australia, I felt like it was still feudalism over there. It's like everyone knew their place. I could feel the class system; the software contracting 2-tier system (inside IR35 vs outside IR35) really emphasized that.
Similar vibes in Germany though a more modern version.
The Netherlands seemed relatively egalitarian for Europe. It's what I like most about Australia. In Australia, there are no artificial social barriers, no class system.
After failing at startups after a decade, I had to live somewhere I would not be seen as a second-class citizen.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:35:08.000Z","created_at_i":1788860108,"id":49607918,"options":[],"parent_id":49606860,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> UK was pretty good at some point (though all the really good jobs were gate-kept by IR35 regulations),
Then we got a PM, who's father in law is the founder of Infosys, who changed the law to favour the likes of Infosys (by making it too risky for smaller players to hire contractors). Scandalous corruption
Contracting was going to be my plan for buying a better house and early retirement, but that's gone now. Thanks Rishi","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:38:56.000Z","created_at_i":1788853136,"id":49606860,"options":[],"parent_id":49606688,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"When I was in Germany a few years ago, I was browsing jobs available in France and most software development jobs were under $55K USD. I don't know how you're supposed to survive on that. You can probably make more money as a waiter.
Germany is not so great either in that sense though at least in crypto sector, the pay was reasonable... Though as a job it was total BS.
UK was pretty good at some point (though all the really good jobs were gate-kept by IR35 regulations), The Netherlands was pretty good (especially contract roles thanks to big tax discounts for foreigners). But IMO, one of the best countries outside of the US for software work has been Australia. I actually came back to Australia because of it. Though it's not quite as lucrative today but it's certainly still much better paid than France and has potential.
That said, if you want to do your own startup and you do not have special business connections or pedigree, then the US is the only real option IMO.
I think it comes down to easy money. Easy come, easy go. To be rich enough to invest in startups in France, you need to be born into old money or be a complete freak of nature. These kinds of people don't part with their money easily. They need a guaranteed return and they can't rely on any media channel to bring traffic. If you live outside of the US, all media channels are essentially working against you; you can literally feel that and so everything is riskier. It's like playing the same game with a massive handicap.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:20:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788852020,"id":49606688,"options":[],"parent_id":49606510,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"US software companies (Google, Meta, MS, etc) have offices in Paris and they pay way more than that. Especially if you take into account total comp (Mistral is private so any stocks you get are "locked" until IPO or sell out)
Yes 90k is more than most French software companies pay, but the salary needs to be competitive with those US companies.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:58:19.000Z","created_at_i":1788850699,"id":49606510,"options":[],"parent_id":49606486,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"some people would rather live in paris than los angels or san francisco (and rightly so, if you ask me)...","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"kraftman","children":[{"author":"selfawareMammal","children":[{"author":"kraftman","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:22:09.000Z","created_at_i":1788855729,"id":49607263,"options":[],"parent_id":49607172,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I literally do.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"qnpnpmqppnp","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:33:15.000Z","created_at_i":1788856395,"id":49607367,"options":[],"parent_id":49607172,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"\u20ac90k is in the top 5% salaries in France. Of course you can live in the Alps, or anywhere else in France for that matter.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"kome","children":[{"author":"alansaber","children":[{"author":"kome","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:45:36.000Z","created_at_i":1788867936,"id":49608968,"options":[],"parent_id":49608499,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"ok, but besides the fact 90k is absolutely fine for CH as well, and incredibly good for italy, france or austria.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"desterothx","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:46:39.000Z","created_at_i":1788867999,"id":49608983,"options":[],"parent_id":49608499,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The alps are shared between Switzerland, Italy and France. You can live in the French alps a lot cheaper than in Switzerland","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:46:52.000Z","created_at_i":1788864412,"id":49608499,"options":[],"parent_id":49608460,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"To be fair, Switzerland is really expensive.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:42:14.000Z","created_at_i":1788864134,"id":49608460,"options":[],"parent_id":49607172,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> You dont even live in the Alps with 90K lmao.
this comment is insane...","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ChrisRR","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:06:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788869193,"id":49609197,"options":[],"parent_id":49607172,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Username does not check out","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:11:12.000Z","created_at_i":1788855072,"id":49607172,"options":[],"parent_id":49606937,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"You dont even live in the Alps with 90K lmao. And if you expect top performance, you should expect top salary. Or at least something competitive. 90K for a company like Mistral is a bit embarrassing.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"user43928","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:36:54.000Z","created_at_i":1788856614,"id":49607397,"options":[],"parent_id":49606937,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I imagine you could do so while working for an US AI Lab in Zurich for five times the net pay.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:48:07.000Z","created_at_i":1788853687,"id":49606937,"options":[],"parent_id":49606486,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"There's more to life than money past a certain point, I'd rather live in the Alps on a lower salary.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"pkos98","children":[{"author":"pimeys","children":[{"author":"tecleandor","children":[{"author":"pimeys","children":[{"author":"tecleandor","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T11:10:13.000Z","created_at_i":1788952213,"id":49624525,"options":[],"parent_id":49610189,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yep, at least in my case (Spain), given the price of the houses and that banks are giving mortgages for 70-80% of the value, tops, you better have 100K in the bank for the down payment if you want to live in a relatively big city. So even with a good salary, is difficult to buy a house.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:37:47.000Z","created_at_i":1788874667,"id":49610189,"options":[],"parent_id":49608531,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yeah, and buying a house is still kind of out of reach with this income if you don't start paying your mortgage whey you're 20something...","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:50:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788864655,"id":49608531,"options":[],"parent_id":49607648,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"That's like top 1% salary for Germany. Maybe 3% if you count family units, or 0.5% for individual taxpayers. I'd say that's pretty good.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:05:21.000Z","created_at_i":1788858321,"id":49607648,"options":[],"parent_id":49607414,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"And 180k in Germany, even in Berlin is pretty good. You are living a very good life with that salary.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"cmrdporcupine","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:16:54.000Z","created_at_i":1788866214,"id":49608724,"options":[],"parent_id":49607414,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Beats 90% of Canadian software engineer salaries. If I wasn't tied down with 2 border collies, a chicken, a cat, and, uh, wife and kids, I'd jump to that in an instant. German quality of life is still pretty good despite all their complaining.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"3748488448","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:39:40.000Z","created_at_i":1788878380,"id":49610977,"options":[],"parent_id":49607414,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"no one makes this in Germany","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:39:02.000Z","created_at_i":1788856742,"id":49607414,"options":[],"parent_id":49606486,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"In Germany AFAIK their Senior base salary ceiling is ~ 180k EUR - approx 210k USD for an Engineering role.
Thats quite competitive for a base salary, as high as max ICT5 Staff base at Apple Munich.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"swiftcoder","children":[{"author":"chrocni380","children":[{"author":"tecleandor","children":[{"author":"woah","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:30:10.000Z","created_at_i":1788885010,"id":49612619,"options":[],"parent_id":49608480,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"You would pay $0 for your healthcare premiums since you would qualify for Medi-Cal","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:45:07.000Z","created_at_i":1788864307,"id":49608480,"options":[],"parent_id":49607690,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Ah yeah, let me know about your healthcare too, specially after you quit that job. And unemployment. And public services. And scientific entities. And general cost of living. Good you have the military to spend a trillion a year in contractors.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"swiftcoder","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:55:26.000Z","created_at_i":1788872126,"id":49609709,"options":[],"parent_id":49607690,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Work a US job for 4 months, quit, take the next 8 months for holiday/vacation, and you still save more money than a European SWE.
Let's assume for the sake of argument that you have a decent software job in the Bay Area, so you earn somewhere in the region of $350k. That little 4 month stint earns you just $116k (since quitting after 4 months means you'll have to return any signing bonus).
Now in the Bay Area your median mortgage is around $3,500/month, so with modest living expenses we're talking a burn of about $5,500/month, meaning you need to spend about $66,000 to cover the year. Plus $17,000 in state and federal taxes, you're now down to a cushion of 33k/year.
That's assuming, of course, that you are happy sending your kids to public school in a dodgy district (private school fees alone would wipe you out, as would the mortgages in a good public school district).
The math doesn't math here chief","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"flaburgan","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:13:23.000Z","created_at_i":1788884003,"id":49612410,"options":[],"parent_id":49607690,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"You clearly never have worked in Europe. The mindset here is completely different.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:11:05.000Z","created_at_i":1788858665,"id":49607690,"options":[],"parent_id":49607488,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Does the US position come with 5 weeks paid vacation? When the US position gets hit with layoffs, do you still have comprehensive healthcare and unemployment coverage?
Work a US job for 4 months, quit, take the next 8 months for holiday/vacation, and you still save more money than a European SWE.
Hey, the 2010s are calling, they want the trope \u201cBuT eUrOpE hAs pAiD lEaVe\u201d back.
Europe in 2026 (France, Germany, UK, Estonia, etc). What a joke. Nobody in the world respects them.
At least the US has jobs and a military. Not as good as before, but better than Europe.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"alexey-salmin","children":[{"author":"dismalaf","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:11:05.000Z","created_at_i":1788880265,"id":49611498,"options":[],"parent_id":49607846,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"US companies almost always adjust salaries for LCOL. The days of them paying 3x local salaries are long past...","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:26:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788859580,"id":49607846,"options":[],"parent_id":49607488,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> quite a lot of folks are happy having a top 5% salary in their own county, without all the stresses and risks of working in the US.
Yes, absolutely, the problem is these are not the people you want to hire.
And the people you do want to hire are either already in US or work for a US company remotely for 3x the salary.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"lII1lIlI11ll","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:12:27.000Z","created_at_i":1788862347,"id":49608214,"options":[],"parent_id":49607488,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> When the US position gets hit with layoffs, do you still have comprehensive healthcare and unemployment coverage?
What does this have to do if the advertised base salary? You would pay for your healthcare and social security with huge taxes from that already meager salary, it is not like those 90k is all-taxes-paid-and-batteries-included offer.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ismailmaj","children":[{"author":"rednb","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:03:53.000Z","created_at_i":1788865433,"id":49608625,"options":[],"parent_id":49608320,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Well said, these talking points pushed by EU politicians for decades need to stop. US white collar workers have access to pretty much the same benefits than EU ones, but have a much higher after tax compensation, even taking health care into account.
And nowadays, with the erosion of the social safety net pushed by the French government, the gap is even more narrow. There definitely are huge inequalities there, US are far from being the heartless place EU politicians like to depict.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"foolfoolz","children":[{"author":"dismalaf","children":[{"author":"foolfoolz","children":[{"author":"swiftcoder","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T12:02:48.000Z","created_at_i":1788955368,"id":49625125,"options":[],"parent_id":49614798,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> it means you don\u2019t accrue or worry about a balance
The flip side of this, is that you don't have a visible balance, so you have to calibrate what is an "acceptable" number of vacation days against what your coworkers take, and in competitive environments, that necessarily tends towards zero.
Plus, when you leave/are fired, the company doesn't have to payout a vacation balance, so they laugh all the way to the bank","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:42:29.000Z","created_at_i":1788892949,"id":49614798,"options":[],"parent_id":49614743,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"unlimited does not mean unlimited because then you would take 365 days off each year. it means you don\u2019t accrue or worry about a balance. i work at an \u201cunlimited\u201d company i see most engineers taking 25-30 days of PTO. it\u2019s a bell curve and there\u2019s outliers on either side but 4-5 weeks/year is quite reasonable","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"0x457","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T01:54:27.000Z","created_at_i":1788918867,"id":49619824,"options":[],"parent_id":49614743,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Well, I take about 2 month off every year. Not all at once, but a week here, week there. No issues.
I also worked in company where this guy was on PTO 6 months a year, but he kept working during his PTO, just on his own schedule. However, at the same company, I recall one coworker had to cancel his flight and company booked him another flight because "we need you to finish this pls". His manager basically beg him to stay one day.
However, in another company, I had issues taking a few days off because "your teammate been here for 2 years didn't a single day off" (I gave them my notice the same day)
So to answer your question from my experience: coin toss and you won't know it until you signed with them. I'd rather take 5 weeks for sure and no calls/emails/texts after the work day.
I'd say the Paris job provides noticeably greater day-to-day life vs Los Angeles with the same before tax salary.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:39:09.000Z","created_at_i":1788892749,"id":49614743,"options":[],"parent_id":49614691,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"1. Does unlimited actually mean unlimited? If I want to take 2 months off every year will there be absolutely zero repercussions?
The others are valid though.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"weberer","children":[{"author":"foolfoolz","children":[{"author":"maigret","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-10T18:01:46.000Z","created_at_i":1789063306,"id":49647859,"options":[],"parent_id":49615255,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"How many days do you actually take?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T19:10:31.000Z","created_at_i":1788894631,"id":49615255,"options":[],"parent_id":49614948,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"not the good jobs. not the jobs that were comparing to mistral level equivalents in the US. i haven\u2019t had metered PTO since 2015 and everyone i know is the same","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:51:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788893511,"id":49614948,"options":[],"parent_id":49614691,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":">1. all good tech jobs in the US have unlimited pto
Its usually 15 days paid time off, and unlimited unpaid.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:36:16.000Z","created_at_i":1788892576,"id":49614691,"options":[],"parent_id":49608320,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"pto/vacation, healthcare, and unemployment differences between US and EU mean nothing to high skilled tech workers in the US
1. all good tech jobs in the US have unlimited pto
2. all good tech jobs in the US have good healthcare plans that will continue after being let go until you get a new job
3. you will be able to\nclaim unemployment, but a good tech company in the US will also give you a severance","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"dfdydx","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-10T08:24:08.000Z","created_at_i":1789028648,"id":49640245,"options":[],"parent_id":49608320,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"This isn't a rebuttal of any of your point but to give a precision, the City of Paris is absurdly small, most of the Paris Area is "suburbs". The US equivalent would be if NYC was only Manhattan, and places like Brooklyn were suburbs.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:25:19.000Z","created_at_i":1788863119,"id":49608320,"options":[],"parent_id":49607488,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Pay isn't the main problem with Paris, it's quality of life.
Housing near work is mostly old Haussmannian buildings that are rent capped and where demand far exceeds supply, so most of the stock is unmaintained. You either accept bad housing in the city or live in the suburbs and commute \u2014 not ideal.
To make matters worse, French companies (especially old-school ones) have a culture of presenteeism for white collar jobs, it's uncommon for people to leave before 6PM and staying late is rewarded as high engagement.
Lastly, you might consider buying and renovating a house so you can escape this dilemma, but it isn't cheap: 2-bedroom (T3) around 700k euros, that represents 20 years of frugal savings on 90k gross.
Vacation, cheap and good healthcare, and unemployment benefits are great in France, but the current government has been eroding these social benefits, and those are not unique to France for well-paid tech workers anyway.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"etamponi","children":[{"author":"3748488448","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:37:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788878278,"id":49610954,"options":[],"parent_id":49608484,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I like how no one is pointing out that those 90k will be taxed at 50% (+20% sales tax et al) vs say 15% and no sales tax in florida
that buys you a lot of dentists visits and vacation funds","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:45:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788864322,"id":49608484,"options":[],"parent_id":49607488,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Come on. We're talking about a salary that is ONE THIRD of what you'd get at AI labs in US (plus the stock and the bonus). And significantly less taxes. Are you sure that 5 weeks of vacation, what you call "comprehensive" healthcare (spoiler alert: it's not), and unemployment coverage are worth 180K/year reduction in salary (pre-taxes)?
To not talk about the toxic environment that European companies generate in general. Ie: "you should be grateful you have this job".","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"zerozerotwo","children":[{"author":"swiftcoder","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:38:42.000Z","created_at_i":1788871122,"id":49609533,"options":[],"parent_id":49609056,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Usually the us position is unlimited pto
Look, the year is 2026, we all understand by now that unlimited PTO is a neat trick to incentivise your employees to take as little time off as possible.
> and yes you have options if laid off
Not great options. Taking California as a concrete example, you will qualify for a maximum of $450/week in unemployment payments, and if you need healthcare coverage, you will need to spend about $1,500/month on COBRA coverage for a family of 4. This is in a region where the median mortgage payment is $3,500/month.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:52:53.000Z","created_at_i":1788868373,"id":49609056,"options":[],"parent_id":49607488,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Usually the us position is unlimited pto and yes you have options if laid off","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"nl","children":[{"author":"youoy","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:30:26.000Z","created_at_i":1788870626,"id":49609444,"options":[],"parent_id":49609150,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Maybe you need to imagine harder.
That aside, if you want to make it rational, you can think of leaves in the context of explore-exploit dilema. Probably a wider exploration would allow you to find better things to exploit. Its like the 20% innovation time that some companies offer","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:01:30.000Z","created_at_i":1788868890,"id":49609150,"options":[],"parent_id":49607488,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Does the US position come with 5 weeks paid vacation? When the US position gets hit with layoffs, do you still have comprehensive healthcare and unemployment coverage?
Maybe this appeal to mediocrity in a competitive market explains Mistral's mediocre performance.
I'm Australian. We have 4 weeks paid leave a year, comprehensive healthcare and unemployment coverage.
Most of my career I avoided taking leave, and I'd usually just get it paid out when I left. Who wants to take leave when you are doing the most interesting, most important thing you can imagine doing?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"onlyrealcuzzo","children":[{"author":"swiftcoder","children":[{"author":"onlyrealcuzzo","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T19:23:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788895438,"id":49615519,"options":[],"parent_id":49615333,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> I didn't have that much at either Amazon
https://www.levels.fyi/benefits/PTO-Vacation-Personal-Days/#...
Most companies start at 3 weeks + 12 bank-ish holidays (or you get unlimited - which you typically have zero issues taking 5+ weeks if you're competent and your boss isn't a dickbag). Most places also give you more PTO with tenure - Amazon does, Meta doesn't.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T19:14:13.000Z","created_at_i":1788894853,"id":49615333,"options":[],"parent_id":49612930,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> It's relatively common to get 4+ weeks paid in GOOD tech jobs in the US
I didn't have that much at either Amazon or Meta.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:50:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788886255,"id":49612930,"options":[],"parent_id":49607488,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Does the US position come with 5 weeks paid vacation?
It's relatively common to get 4+ weeks paid in GOOD tech jobs in the US - of which these would be considered.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:49:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788857346,"id":49607488,"options":[],"parent_id":49606486,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Last I saw job offers for mistral (engineering, Paris) it advertised 90k euros base salary. Not sure how they\u2019re intending to compete with the US when even a top AI lab can\u2019t afford to be competitive :-/
Does the US position come with 5 weeks paid vacation? When the US position gets hit with layoffs, do you still have comprehensive healthcare and unemployment coverage?
Yes, EU software Eng salaries are a lot lower than their US equivalents, but quite a lot of folks are happy having a top 5% salary in their own county, without all the stresses and risks of working in the US.
As a concrete example, a few years back it leaked that Dan Abramov's (very decent) London salary was half what his US peers earned. Didn't seem to bother the man much at all...","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"benhurmarcel","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:46:43.000Z","created_at_i":1788860803,"id":49608009,"options":[],"parent_id":49606486,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"That's pretty high for engineering in France though. Most engineers by far are way below that there, this is top management level.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"scotty79","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:47:47.000Z","created_at_i":1788860867,"id":49608017,"options":[],"parent_id":49606486,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Not sure how they\u2019re intending to compete with the US when even a top AI lab can\u2019t afford to be competitive.
It probably means they don't, they just do their own thing how they see fit.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"santiagobasulto","children":[{"author":"dzogchen","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T22:34:21.000Z","created_at_i":1788906861,"id":49618094,"options":[],"parent_id":49611062,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Yes it is...","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:45:25.000Z","created_at_i":1788878725,"id":49611062,"options":[],"parent_id":49606486,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I was going to reply with "shit americans say" until I realize you're based in Paris.\nIsn't 90k a very good salary even for an expensive city like Paris? If it's not, MAN i'm out of touch with reality. In Italy 90K is great even in Milan.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"tensor","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:20:37.000Z","created_at_i":1788884437,"id":49612503,"options":[],"parent_id":49606486,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I'd say "not being in the US" is a pretty massive selling point.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"rcarmo","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T06:01:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788933693,"id":49621743,"options":[],"parent_id":49606486,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Also, no remote postings in Europe is just stupid.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T06:55:43.000Z","created_at_i":1788850543,"id":49606486,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Last I saw job offers for mistral (engineering, Paris) it advertised 90k euros base salary. Not sure how they\u2019re intending to compete with the US when even a top AI lab can\u2019t afford to be competitive :-/","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"tangled","children":[{"author":"andsoitis","children":[{"author":"dist-epoch","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:50:51.000Z","created_at_i":1788853851,"id":49606956,"options":[],"parent_id":49606647,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"You are conflating two concepts into one words, immigration and illegal immigration are not the same thing","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"swiftcoder","children":[{"author":"tm-guimaraes","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:13:02.000Z","created_at_i":1788880382,"id":49611524,"options":[],"parent_id":49607436,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Well, being secular is kind of a catholic thing. Besides the vatican (for obvious reasons), catholics do have that tradition.
To Caesar what is Caesar\u2019s, to God\u2026","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:42:09.000Z","created_at_i":1788856929,"id":49607436,"options":[],"parent_id":49606647,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Spain is exceptionally liberal on LGBT issues while remaining more religious than some northern countries
When you move here, "more religious" turns out to pretty much be window dressing. Yes, they still celebrate a bunch of the old catholic holidays, parading saints around on feast days, but apart from a handful of older folks, nobody actually believes.
Particularly when compared to the US, where a large minority is still going around loudly thumping bibles, Spain is a very secular country.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:16:13.000Z","created_at_i":1788851773,"id":49606647,"options":[],"parent_id":49606544,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> LLMs embody value systems, and American and European values are not the same (yes, there are overlaps, but also key differences).
There are also some areas where values across Europe are quite divergent. Think LGBT rights and social acceptance, religion & secularism, immigration & multiculturalism.
And countries don\u2019t fall into neat \u201cliberal west vs conservative east\u201d. Spain is exceptionally liberal on LGBT issues while remaining more religious than some northern countries; Denmark is socially liberal but has adopted relatively restrictive immigration policies.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"fallingbananna","children":[{"author":"AureliusMA","children":[{"author":"disgruntledphd2","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:37:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788874655,"id":49610187,"options":[],"parent_id":49607680,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> It\u2019s a different culture with different rules
Nah, it's more that there's no Capital Markets Union, so there's just ~30 smaller pots of money scattered across each country.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:09:31.000Z","created_at_i":1788858571,"id":49607680,"options":[],"parent_id":49606892,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It\u2019s a different culture with different rules, if it was that easy it would have been done already. See my other comment about lack of budget at a federal level.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:42:37.000Z","created_at_i":1788853357,"id":49606892,"options":[],"parent_id":49606544,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":">I\u2019m sort of surprised that the EU isn\u2019t stepping in to support them.
On a similar note: Why does it have to be the EU to step up?
Why doesn't EU rather speed up making VC investments more attractive, so that EU and banks don't do the majority of investing?
*I don't have answers to these questions. It just frustrates me how many investments here come from politicians and banks, rather than from investors, people, and companies.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"dist-epoch","children":[{"author":"utopiah","children":[{"author":"weberer","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:49:37.000Z","created_at_i":1788893377,"id":49614916,"options":[],"parent_id":49607047,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Its a roundabout way of not recognizing Taiwan as an independent country. The USA officially has a "One China policy".","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:59:58.000Z","created_at_i":1788854398,"id":49607047,"options":[],"parent_id":49606947,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"This "Non-Signatory Participants : Taiwan *" is so weird precisely because Taiwan is the one who started the Silicon shield few years ago by making TSMC central to the whole ecosystem.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:49:14.000Z","created_at_i":1788853754,"id":49606947,"options":[],"parent_id":49606544,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> with Pax Americana looking increasingly shaky.
that is being replaced with Pax Silica
https://www.state.gov/pax-silica","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"bambax","children":[{"author":"easytiger","children":[{"author":"AureliusMA","children":[{"author":"Tenoke","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:00:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788861635,"id":49608122,"options":[],"parent_id":49607659,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It's possible to be a waste of European money that could be better used elsewhere, though. I think the same about LeCun's company sucking up the little funding here.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:06:11.000Z","created_at_i":1788858371,"id":49607659,"options":[],"parent_id":49607484,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"European money invested in a European company ought to be a good thing, don\u2019t you think?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"gib444","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:19:18.000Z","created_at_i":1788859158,"id":49607775,"options":[],"parent_id":49607484,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Do you think it's not?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"guiriduro","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:45:35.000Z","created_at_i":1788860735,"id":49608003,"options":[],"parent_id":49607484,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Imagine the fund were distributing to several teams, but let's say Z.ai and Deepseek were european and among them. What percentage would be allocated to Mistral in that case? OK, the other two aren't, but in the same vein, should the EU fund be saving its powder until such a project shows up?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"bambax","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:57:05.000Z","created_at_i":1788861425,"id":49608092,"options":[],"parent_id":49607484,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I don't know. Government funds have a unique way of being often wrong, so this may be the kiss of death. But it is a sign that the EU is helping Mistral.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:48:31.000Z","created_at_i":1788857311,"id":49607484,"options":[],"parent_id":49607014,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Do you think that's a good thing?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:56:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788854215,"id":49607014,"options":[],"parent_id":49606544,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> I\u2019m sort of surprised that the EU isn\u2019t stepping in to support them.
It is! The second largest investor in this round is Scaleup Europe Fund:
https://eic.ec.europa.eu/eic-fund/scaleup-europe-fund_en","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"world2vec","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:54:24.000Z","created_at_i":1788857664,"id":49607532,"options":[],"parent_id":49606544,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":""Pax Sinica", Chinese Peace","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"AureliusMA","children":[{"author":"kilroy123","children":[{"author":"disgruntledphd2","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:38:14.000Z","created_at_i":1788874694,"id":49610194,"options":[],"parent_id":49608683,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> They're pushing hard to do Euro bonds precisely for things like this.
I really, really wish that this was true, but basically no-one is pushing for euro bonds (even though they'd be a great idea).","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:10:38.000Z","created_at_i":1788865838,"id":49608683,"options":[],"parent_id":49607669,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They're pushing hard to do Euro bonds precisely for things like this.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"saelthavron","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T14:22:42.000Z","created_at_i":1788877362,"id":49610754,"options":[],"parent_id":49607669,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"What do you mean by "Europe has no budget of their own like the USA and China do"? The EU was specifically mentioned and the EU does have a budget, debt, and income:
https://european-union.europa.eu/institutions-law-budget/bud...","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:08:15.000Z","created_at_i":1788858495,"id":49607669,"options":[],"parent_id":49606544,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Europe has no budget of their own like the USA and China do, because there is no debt nor taxation at the European level. That\u2019s the reason for the complication you are noticing.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Tenoke","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:59:21.000Z","created_at_i":1788861561,"id":49608106,"options":[],"parent_id":49606544,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Europe absolutely needs a home-grown AI lab, especially with Pax Americana looking increasingly shaky.
The only problem (at least in the LLM space) is that you can do more in Europe by just getting the best Chinese Open weights model (do a finetune if you really want) and do more for cheaper than using Mistral.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:01:38.000Z","created_at_i":1788850898,"id":49606544,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Europe absolutely needs a home-grown AI lab, especially with Pax Americana looking increasingly shaky.
LLMs embody value systems, and American and European values are not the same (yes, there are overlaps, but also key differences).
More nefariously, I can also imagine LLMs that silently degrade their reasoning when used in a national security context of a non-US country.
So, Mistral may not be competitive with OpenAI and Anthropic, but in many contexts that doesn\u2019t matter. And, perhaps this gap could be closed with more funding (the three billion funding figure is a rounding error next to US labs). I\u2019m sort of surprised that the EU isn\u2019t stepping in to support them.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"zoobab","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:21:17.000Z","created_at_i":1788852077,"id":49606695,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Still no training data in sight.
Maybe we need to abolish copyright?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"baq","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:28:22.000Z","created_at_i":1788852502,"id":49606758,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"10-20x more still needed, and then somewhere to build a couple DCs. Fingers crossed they make it, neither US nor Chinese labs can be trusted, even with open weights.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"nik736","children":[{"author":"BoredomIsFun","children":[{"author":"nik736","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:20:19.000Z","created_at_i":1788880819,"id":49611637,"options":[],"parent_id":49607746,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral Small 4 is also a MoE model, with way more params, so I would expect it to perform better. Our benchmark involves around 10% communication and writing in German and English and Gemma 4 26B A4B beats it although creative writing is the only category in our benchmark which might be a bit subjective.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:16:38.000Z","created_at_i":1788858998,"id":49607746,"options":[],"parent_id":49606808,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Mistral Small 4 is way worse than Gemma 4 26B A4B
Depends for what purpose? I found large Mistrals are massively better than Gemma 4 at creative writing: have more natural tone, better consistency than 26B as it is MoE.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:33:09.000Z","created_at_i":1788852789,"id":49606808,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral has solid OCR, STT and TTS models and I would love to support them by switching with all of our business workloads to Mistral... but their LLM models are sadly not competitive at all. In our business benchmarks their Mistral Medium 3.5 with reasoning is worse than Gemma 4 31B and Glimmer 30B. It's a 128B dense model that's priced accordingly! Mistral Small 4 is way worse than Gemma 4 26B A4B. I applaude the effort that they release those models as open weight but Gemma 4 models are currently way easier to run with more tok/s and less hardware. Their API pricing is just insane for what you get. But I guess enterprise customers don't care about it, this is why they are probably not lowering it.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"darkteflon","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:39:12.000Z","created_at_i":1788853152,"id":49606863,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Surely outfits like Sakana will be looking at a similar strategy. The White House / Anthropic spat supercharged all this.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Tepix","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T07:58:15.000Z","created_at_i":1788854295,"id":49607032,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I really hope that Mistral will catch up. \nI'm left wondering why so many Chinese labs manage to be competitive.
Perhaps Mistral has too high moral standards to keep up?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"whazor","children":[{"author":"rhdunn","children":[{"author":"raumgeist","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:49:25.000Z","created_at_i":1788868165,"id":49609015,"options":[],"parent_id":49607252,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"On a higher level it might make sense to build the expertise that comes with base training. \nI dont know enough about the process to estimate these gains, but china has been doing it in manufacturing for decades. \nAll the money in the world is useless when no one knows how to do the thing","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:21:13.000Z","created_at_i":1788855673,"id":49607252,"options":[],"parent_id":49607130,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It only makes sense to train a frontier model if you are trying a different architecture to one that is available from an existing frontier model. This is because the different model architecture will learn the weights differently.
It may make sense to train a frontier model on an existing architecture if the base model is not available and the instruction trained version doesn't fit with what you want. There are techniques like ablation, but those could have other effects on the model, and there can still be lingering effects of the instruction training in the model that surface less frequently (e.g. on an input not covered by the ablation training).
Otherwise, fine tuning is definitely the way to go. However, you need to be careful not to over-tune the model such that it is only tuned to the data you are training it on.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:07:32.000Z","created_at_i":1788854852,"id":49607130,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"It makes no sense to train frontier models from scratch anymore. The best frontier models are only a half year ahead of Chinese open models. In this regard Anthropic and OpenAI are also in a bad spot when they waste so much compute on training models.
An important factor is that fine tuning existing open models is incredible cheap. You can easily change any cultural biases if you want a model to be 'sovereign'. And Mistral could combine that with their custom data sets for their enterprise customer needs. Mistral still trains their own models, but they also seem to offer fine tuning existing models.
With model weights being commoditized, another differentiator could be deploying efficient inference chips, especially if you combine it with a developer ecosystem for vendor lock-in. That is why it is interesting that both Samsung and ASML are investors, since they are companies that could make a difference in this area.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Vineetyadav2","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:08:33.000Z","created_at_i":1788854913,"id":49607146,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"another ponji scheme","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"piyush_patel_ha","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:17:39.000Z","created_at_i":1788855459,"id":49607220,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I have used some of models of mistral, I'm liking where they're heading.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"JanTurnherr","children":[{"author":"alex_duf","children":[{"author":"JanTurnherr","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:42:07.000Z","created_at_i":1788860527,"id":49607980,"options":[],"parent_id":49607813,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"A Visual Novel. Its from a Software-Engineering standpoint interesting, since the requirements for this specific Use-Case are immense.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:23:18.000Z","created_at_i":1788859398,"id":49607813,"options":[],"parent_id":49607254,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"What's VN in this context?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:21:32.000Z","created_at_i":1788855692,"id":49607254,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I'm using Mistral for a local VN Proofreader and its by far the best Local 14B Model for this specific use case.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"glimshe","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:46:20.000Z","created_at_i":1788857180,"id":49607471,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I know a lot of people who use AI, but literally nobody who uses Mistral.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"poisonborz","children":[{"author":"pimeys","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:03:00.000Z","created_at_i":1788858180,"id":49607622,"options":[],"parent_id":49607575,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They try to build them, but for example in Finland where there's cheap electricity and lot of interest to build them, the people started protesting on rising electricity prices and now the politicians are noticing this.
Same in Denmark.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"olowe","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T09:27:37.000Z","created_at_i":1788859657,"id":49607852,"options":[],"parent_id":49607575,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral now serves GLM-5.2: https://mistral.ai/news/regional-inference-open-models-new-c...","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"alansaber","children":[{"author":"raumgeist","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:40:28.000Z","created_at_i":1788867628,"id":49608920,"options":[],"parent_id":49608536,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They will also be faster in space. Relatively. \nThe data transmission might be the bottleneck then, but who knows - a rocket full of ssds might go a long way.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:51:31.000Z","created_at_i":1788864691,"id":49608536,"options":[],"parent_id":49607575,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"For our data centres we must go to the one place not yet corrupted by capitalism- space!","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T08:58:04.000Z","created_at_i":1788857884,"id":49607575,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"For all that say Mistral is "at least something" for EU: where are the big EU-owned datacenters where we can run Chinese SOTA models safely, and labs that fork and quantize them on EU data? Wouldn't that be "more something"? Even if this method still depends on external resources short term, it's a money problem, and EU just loves pouring money on problems.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"jeanmichelselli","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:15:38.000Z","created_at_i":1788862538,"id":49608246,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I just hope they don't become the new OpenAI...","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"brokegrammer","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T10:33:46.000Z","created_at_i":1788863626,"id":49608380,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I love Mistral and I use it whenever I don't care about quality. For example, it's my go to model for generating git commit messages by leveraging their free codestral model.
I wouldn't pay for it though.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"kensai","children":[{"author":"smurf9852","children":[{"author":"znnajdla","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T18:38:00.000Z","created_at_i":1788892680,"id":49614723,"options":[],"parent_id":49608862,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Never underestimate a small dedicated underdog. You never know who might catch up later in the race","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:33:32.000Z","created_at_i":1788867212,"id":49608862,"options":[],"parent_id":49608692,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Artificial intelligence is only as useful as its intelligence. A dumb model provides no value to anybody. \nFlock to a dumb model? - doubt it. Forced by the EU? - i can see it happen, sadly.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:12:46.000Z","created_at_i":1788865966,"id":49608692,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral has a huge advantage that will shine later... it's a EU-based company. We are already seeing signs of digital sovereignity everywhere. The clients will flock to them, I dare to say government will be even enforcing clients to contract Mistral. So actually being the top dog in benchmarks matters less, than having secure servers and datacenters which are physically based in Europe.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"phtrivier","children":[{"author":"TMWNN","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:39:41.000Z","created_at_i":1788885581,"id":49612759,"options":[],"parent_id":49608943,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Quite the opposite. I remember when Mistral was talked about seriously as a frontier model lab. That certainly isn't the sentiment here.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:43:15.000Z","created_at_i":1788867795,"id":49608943,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"The vibe in the conversation seems new to me. As if we're crossing a section in the "First they ignore you, then laugh at you, then hate you, etc..."
Seems like they reached the laugh / hate border. Or am I the only one reading that ?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"petcat","children":[{"author":"barrenko","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:58:19.000Z","created_at_i":1788872299,"id":49609744,"options":[],"parent_id":49609013,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"" And it will most likely end up as an acquisition." if they were really a thread, OAI / Anthropic would probably have swallowed them up by now, they're just going to go a decade as a EU zombie consultancy.
I hope I'm wrong here.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:49:01.000Z","created_at_i":1788868141,"id":49609013,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"EU is in a precarious situation with Mistral. If you look at their investor sheet, it's primarily American and other foreign investors with some token amount coming from within the EU. It seems like this is positioning as an acquisition play, most likely by a foreign AI tech firm.
We can look at Heart Aerospace for an example of a European future-tech company that warned the EU repeatedly about the regulatory and capital market being uncompetitive, and then within 2 years just relocated entirely to the US.
My suspicion is that Mistral does not have enough money and enough access to GPU compute to be competitive long-term. And it will most likely end up as an acquisition.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"asimpleusecase","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:52:41.000Z","created_at_i":1788868361,"id":49609052,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"So what happens when Mistral creates a collection of powerful AIs for different clients that have fundamentally different ethical frameworks from each other? Then those AI interact? Do they politely agree to disagree? Or do they goal seek against each other?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"capocasa","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T11:54:24.000Z","created_at_i":1788868464,"id":49609067,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Last time I tried Mistral large it was pretty bad at programming but I hear they're fairly good at European language legal.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"sbinnee","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T12:31:25.000Z","created_at_i":1788870685,"id":49609459,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I am still waiting for their large model. Seemingly they only recently started combining reasoning, agentic, and multimodal in one model. They have mistral-3.5 medium and mistral-4 small. There is no 3.5 small nor large not to mention no 4 medium nor 4 large. These model numbers to me seem like that their model release did not meet the schedule. I am still waiting for 4 large and expect it to match at least glm 5.2 performance.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"barrenko","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:00:07.000Z","created_at_i":1788872407,"id":49609765,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"My dudes, the EU doesn't have enough gas to survive the following winter, let alone if Poutine decides to go around Ukraine and test NATO in production.
Mistral is the cherry on the sundae of our concerns. It's a spiritual thing.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"novoreorx","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T13:18:16.000Z","created_at_i":1788873496,"id":49609949,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Mistral is quite fast for my proofreading tasks. I've benchmarked various LLM providers on my Singapore and Hong Kong VPS instances, and `mistral-small-latest` was the fastest. The quality was not that high tho, but it is worth it for the speed","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"cmiles8","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:15:43.000Z","created_at_i":1788880543,"id":49611575,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Congrats. They are well positioned on the sovereignty play.
We live in crazy times where 3B seems like a conservative number for a company focused on the right use cases, but in this bubble environment 3B is conservative.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Decabytes","children":[{"author":"s_dev","children":[{"author":"xquce","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:38:10.000Z","created_at_i":1788881890,"id":49611914,"options":[],"parent_id":49611667,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"\u201cThat kind of poor customer service just won't fly in the US.\u201d\nFirst time hearing someone claim consumer protections are better in the US and the EU. People lose whole decades of data from top world top 10 largest US companies and those have no service and no consumer protection in the US nor court justice ad those where waived in their ToS.\nIf you didn't get the product you purchased and are in the EU you can take it to your ombudsman","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:21:55.000Z","created_at_i":1788880915,"id":49611667,"options":[],"parent_id":49611577,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Power generates healthy scepticism and contempt. Since Mistral has very little relative to other AI companies it doesn't draw the same ire.
Like Lovable they seem to settling in to a niche but in this case supplying AI to large EU firms rather than acting as a standin for Wordpress/Squarespace etc.
From a consumer point of view I'm still angry with them for having supplied me with 1 month of premium despite having paid for 11 months. That kind of poor customer service just won't fly in the US.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:15:54.000Z","created_at_i":1788880554,"id":49611577,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"So what is the sentiment on Mistral? Does it get the same hate as other AI companies? Or does its European and open focus make people give it some slack? It doesn\u2019t really seem like anti AI people care if something was AI generated with Mistral vs something else. If it\u2019s AI generated it is bad and that\u2019s that.
Doesn\u2019t seem like if LibreOffice partnered with Mistral for more ethical AI features, people would be excited about it","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"max-privatevoid","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:23:43.000Z","created_at_i":1788881023,"id":49611694,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"> Mistral is the only AI company in the world building the full stack required to answer that question: open-weight models, the infrastructure and the compute capacity they run on
Didn't know Mistral sold affordable inference hardware. /s","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"wolttam","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T15:52:06.000Z","created_at_i":1788882726,"id":49612121,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"I don\u2019t get the push on infra.
Focus on the models","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"MetroWind","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:15:41.000Z","created_at_i":1788884141,"id":49612438,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"A news article without a date? I've seen everything.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"ssonal","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T16:49:37.000Z","created_at_i":1788886177,"id":49612906,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"They were one of the earliest to pull out of the frontier treadmill, and focus on the sovereign AI narrative. Local champion is a very sensible place to be given today's market conditions.
Business not limited to Europe though. Growing fast all through Asia as well.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Simon_O_Rourke","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:07:05.000Z","created_at_i":1788887225,"id":49613166,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Good for them!","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"Avlin67","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:28:45.000Z","created_at_i":1788888525,"id":49613505,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"will they release great open sources models to use ?","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"inemesitaffia","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-08T17:31:18.000Z","created_at_i":1788888678,"id":49613549,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"Add zero and I'll take it seriously","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null},{"author":"rldjbpin","children":[],"created_at":"2026-09-09T12:28:00.000Z","created_at_i":1788956880,"id":49625447,"options":[],"parent_id":49605767,"points":null,"story_id":49605767,"text":"we got access to their platform from work. the "best" model, or the one i've used the most so far is GLM-5.2!
for all the promise, i would temper my expectations for a frontier model for coding or general purpose. but for niche use cases (document parsing, voice*, etc.) and as a platform to handle finetuned versions, etc. for small-ish pilots, i can see the value of partnering with them.
if the core model could be any open-weights solution out there, the moat dissolves really quickly.","title":null,"type":"comment","url":null}],"created_at":"2026-09-08T05:06:23.000Z","created_at_i":1788843983,"id":49605767,"options":[],"parent_id":null,"points":850,"story_id":49605767,"text":null,"title":"Mistral raises \u20ac3B","type":"story","url":"https://mistral.ai/news/mistral-makes-sovereign-open-weight-ai-to-frontier/"}