Hi,
On 12/2/23 13:00, kde-devel-requ...@kde.org wrote:
Hey Loren,
I agree with everyone else that as long as the model is ethically sourced and
local-by-default (which is my two main problems with modern LLMs.) I see no
qualms about including such a frontend in KDE.
Re ethical LLMs Nextcloud has developed a traffic light system based on
three parameters
(https://nextcloud.com/blog/ai-in-nextcloud-what-why-and-how/) to
address some of the concerns discussed in this thread:
1. Is the software open source? (Both for inferencing and training)
2. Is the trained model freely available for self-hosting?
3. Is the training data available and free to use?
Perhaps KDE could adopt a similar system?
I think the hardest part will be the marketing around this new software. One
of our current goals is "Sustainable Software" and current LLM models as far
as I understand is extremely power hungry and inefficient. If you do go ahead
with this project, I would be very careful with how we promote it. It would
have to somehow push KDE values while also avoiding the ethical, climate and
social minefield that's currently littering this topic. Just something to keep
in mind 🙂
I agree with the concerns Josh raises about the energy consumption of
training LLMs (see, e.g., [1]). A benefit of satisfying the above
characteristics is it is then possible for us to measure the energy
consumption for training/using the LLMs. This would enable KDE to be
transparent about what these tools consume in terms of energy and
present this information to users.
k
Cheers,
Joseph
[1] "The real climate and transformative impact of ICT: A critique of
estimates, trends, and regulations", 2021. Charlotte Freitag, Mike
Berners-Lee, Kelly Widdicks, Bran Knowles, Gordon S. Blair, and Adrian
Friday. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.patter.2021.100340
"AI has the greatest potential for impact given the complexity of
training and inferencing on big data, and especially so-called deep
learning. Researchers have estimated that 284,019 kg of CO2e are emitted
from training just one machine learning algorithm for natural language
processing, an impact that is five times the lifetime emissions of a
car. While this figure has been criticized as an extreme example (a more
typical case of model training may only produce around 4.5 kg of CO2),
the carbon footprint of model training is still recognized as a
potential issue in the future given the trends in computation growth for
AI: AI training computations have in fact increased by 300,0003 between
2012 and 2018 (an exponential increase doubling every 3.4 months)."
Thanks,
Josh
--
Joseph P. De Veaugh-Geiss
KDE Internal Communications & KDE Eco Community Manager
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Matrix: @joseph:kde.org
Generally available Monday-Thursday from 10-16h CET/CEST. Outside of
these times it may take a little longer for me to respond.
KDE Eco: Building Energy-Efficient Free Software!
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