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397 points Anon84 | 32 comments | | HN request time: 1.397s | source | bottom
1. baalimago ◴[] No.45126101[source]
Strongest argument I see for Mistral is that it's European. Which isn't a very good argument.
replies(6): >>45126165 #>>45126178 #>>45126226 #>>45126584 #>>45126709 #>>45126780 #
2. drno123 ◴[] No.45126165[source]
Also, speed.
3. mkreis ◴[] No.45126178[source]
It is in regards to the GDPR. If you're a European vendor and process PII, you must ensure some level of data protection. If you want to be on the safe side, you'll pick European providers instead of US hyperscalers (who have EU data centers, but are still US owned).
replies(2): >>45126317 #>>45126434 #
4. t0lo ◴[] No.45126226[source]
[flagged]
replies(4): >>45126314 #>>45126654 #>>45127714 #>>45131570 #
5. apwell23 ◴[] No.45126314[source]
how you come you are helping ycombinator by posting here then?
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6. apwell23 ◴[] No.45126317[source]
how does the 'memory' feature in mistral work wrt GDPR if i type in my personal information ?
replies(1): >>45126387 #
7. dax_ ◴[] No.45126387{3}[source]
GDPR doesn't stop personal data being stored. It handles whom it can be shared with, when it has to be deleted, and only collect as much data as required. Also gives transparency to the users about their data use.

And if I were to give over personal information to an AI company, then absolutely I'll prefer a company who actually complies with GDPR.

replies(1): >>45126454 #
8. mseri ◴[] No.45126434[source]
True, but we should also remember that some services like the fast responses and the image generations (may?) run in US data centres also for Mistral. So that part of the data, in principle, may end up in the ends of other extra European countries.

This said, I am really supportive of Mistral, like their work, and hope that they will get more recognition and more EU-centric institutional support.

9. apwell23 ◴[] No.45126454{4}[source]
yea i mean. how would they know how to remove it from 'memory' since they have no way to know with 100% accuracy which parts of my chart are PII.
replies(2): >>45126652 #>>45126723 #
10. esafak ◴[] No.45126513{3}[source]
Activity here costs ycombinator too.
11. o_m ◴[] No.45126538{3}[source]
All or nothing mentally wont get you very far. You're digital device is probably made in China, but that doesn't mean you'll want to store your personal data in a Chinese data center. I try to choose European whenever possible and avoid or limit the use of American, Chinese, and Russian tech.
12. saubeidl ◴[] No.45126563{3}[source]
It is good to provide viewpoints opposing the imperialist propaganda that is frequently being spread here.
replies(1): >>45128717 #
13. weweersdfsd ◴[] No.45126584[source]
It's a good argument if you care about privacy and geopolitical risk, like a dictator suddenly deciding that citizens of your country should no longer have access, or should be monitored when using the service.
14. swores ◴[] No.45126652{5}[source]
As a metaphor (well, a simile) think of it like if they were providing you with an FTP server or cloud storage. It's your choice what, if any, personal data you put into the system, and your responsibility to manage it, not theirs.

As to what to do if you, with a customer's permission, put their PD (PII being an American term) into the system, and then get a request to delete it... I'm not sure, sorry I'm not an expert on LLMs. But it's your responsibility to not put the PD into the system unless you're confident that the company providing the services won't spread it around beyond your control, and your responsibility not to put it into the system unless you know how to manage it (including deleting it if and when required to) going forwards.

Hopefully somebody else can come along and fill in my gaps on the options there - perhaps it's as simple as telling it "please remove all traces of X from memory", I don't know.

edit: Of course, you could sign an agreement with an AI provider for them to be a "data controller", giving them responsibility for managing the data in a GDPR-compliant way, but I'm not aware of Mistral offering that option.

edit 2: Given my non-expertise on LLMs, and my experience dealing with GDPR issues, my personal feeling is that I wouldn't be comfortable using any LLM for processing PD that wasn't entirely under my control, privately hosted. If I had something I wanted to do that required using SOTA models and therefore needed to use inference provided by a company like Mistral, I'd want either myself or my colleagues to understand a hell of a lot more about the subject than I currently do before going down that road. Thankfully it's not something I've had to dig into so far.

15. loudmax ◴[] No.45126654[source]
I'm glad to see a European company succeeding here, especially since Mistral has released open weights models. But you're deluding yourself if you think Mistral is any more moral than its American counterparts.
replies(2): >>45127283 #>>45128487 #
16. rsynnott ◴[] No.45126709[source]
I mean, if the US had just had a succession of Obamas (or even an alternating succession of Obamas and GWBushes, really), then that wouldn't be a great argument. Given the current instability and capriciousness of the US regime, though... If you were a European company who wanted to use an LLM, it's going to at least factor into your risk planning.
17. rsynnott ◴[] No.45126723{5}[source]
The cautious approach on their part would be to just delete the whole thing on any subject access deletion request.
replies(1): >>45138544 #
18. epolanski ◴[] No.45126780[source]
It's fast. Very fast. It's even faster than Gemini flash, which is fast.
replies(1): >>45129050 #
19. ljlolel ◴[] No.45127283{3}[source]
Or if Europe is
20. pembrook ◴[] No.45127714[source]
[flagged]
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21. Barrin92 ◴[] No.45128310{3}[source]
>It's easy to look virtuous when you have other countries handle the 'immoral' military stuff,[...] Europe is a 24-year old trust fund kid working in a vegan commune

Europe has a higher industrial output than the US. In Unterlüß a town of 3500 people, Rheinmetall makes about 50% as many 155mm shells as the entire US makes annually. There's a reason your trust fund metaphor takes place in Brooklyn.

You might also want to remember that article 5 was invoked once, and it wasn't by Europe.

replies(1): >>45130228 #
22. troyvit ◴[] No.45128487{3}[source]
Taking the morality of a company on its own isn't how I look at it, it's also the context. You might be right that if Mistral was born in the U.S. instead of France it would do the same shady stuff Anthropic and OpenAI are doing, but it wasn't and therefore it isn't. As a result it's a company I personally can work with for now.
23. troyvit ◴[] No.45128562{3}[source]
> If we pretend history begins at 1991...ignore the colonialism, world wars, fascism, communism, genocide, and body counts collectively in the hundred millions...

Uhhh it isn't Europe taking all its bad news out of its museums, friend. That's the good ol' U.S.A. attempting to hide from its own history.

> Europe is a 24-year old trust fund kid working in a vegan commune while living in a $2M Brooklyn apartment paid for by her dad who is an executive at Exxon.

What a very ... American analogy.

replies(2): >>45128615 #>>45130333 #
24. apwell23 ◴[] No.45128615{4}[source]
> Uhhh it isn't Europe taking all its bad news out of its museums, friend.

Yes they proudly fill their museums to the brim with colonial loot. So Europeans can reminisce about good old days when they were the top dog.

25. apwell23 ◴[] No.45128717{4}[source]
thank you for your service.
26. htrp ◴[] No.45129050[source]
Is that due to usage (or lack thereof)?
27. pembrook ◴[] No.45130228{4}[source]
Ahhh apparently Europe is more immoral than OP thought! Good job guys.

Kidding aside, if Europe is this hidden powerhouse as you claim, then its even more odd to be begging the Americans for defense support/leadership from across the Atlantic, and still be importing natural gas from the "evil" Russians while supposedly in a fight with them. Seems to undermine your point no?

28. pembrook ◴[] No.45130333{4}[source]
Most of the "europe-is-utopia" voices on this site are actually American euro-fetishists in SF/LA/NYC. So I felt it the American analogy is more fitting.

If I'm wrong though, the irony that the European tech community has to resort to a US message board to voice their opinions, only serves to further underline my point.

29. dang ◴[] No.45131570[source]
"Eschew flamebait. Avoid generic tangents."

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

replies(1): >>45133728 #
30. dang ◴[] No.45131571{3}[source]
Please don't respond to a bad comment by breaking the site guidelines yourself. That only makes things worse.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

31. t0lo ◴[] No.45133728{3}[source]
Yeah, I could have definitely posited that in a way that didn't start a flame war
32. apwell23 ◴[] No.45138544{6}[source]
yes if they aren't using that to train