47 points joebuckwilliams 3 hours ago 10 comments
bix6 22 minutes ago | parent
Can anyone recommend me a viable alternative to these clowns? I would like to move my work (excel and light coding) off the big guys. My computer isn’t very powerful though so I need to upgrade or find hosted models (host my own?) that won’t steal my sensitive data?
marcuskaz 19 minutes ago | parent
OpenRouter or Fireworks are two of many that allow you to run numerous different models. You can use open code harnesses like Pi or Opencode that connect easily to these services.
bix6 15 minutes ago | parent
Thank you! Is there one you’d recommend in particular when working with sensitive data?
tolugenius 11 minutes ago | parent
You might want to consider a local setup? Personally I do model + llama.cpp + Pi + tmux, that's as barebones as you can get and everything is great. I also use opencode for bigger task, I could probably hook that to a local model but I'm not sure (still new to this). But if you work with sensitive data you need a local setup purely.
jmtulloss 8 minutes ago | parent
I’m biased (my wife works there) but Fireworks or another US-based inference provider is going to be a better fit than OpenRouter. Fireworks has zero data retention by default[1] and has tools to make it easy to run your existing harness against open models [2]
OpenRouter isn’t a provider, they route to other providers, so you would need to specify which ones you’re comfortable with anyway.
[1]:https://docs.fireworks.ai/guides/security_compliance/data_ha...
cmiles8 5 minutes ago | parent
A lot of companies are starting to run towards open models on walled off infra. There might be a moat to be had in really good infra-as-a-service for hosting models, but there’s zero moat to be had in the models themselves. Which is a problem for those trying to convince people a proprietary model company should be worth trillions.
dgellow 5 minutes ago | parent
That’s an advantage, not a moat
badsectoracula 2 minutes ago | parent
> Amodei, meanwhile, outlined some very specific things he wants from Washington: Stop selling Nvidia chips to China so its AI companies can’t build better models, and a crackdown on model distillation.
You have to be the embodiment of hubris to believe the only reason a technologically advanced country of 1.4 billion people with several AI labs and government support can make competitive models is because they all distill yours.