This is a joke right?

Even ignoring monetary subsidies, there are the non-monetary ones: not being sued into oblivious by the government for their countless hacks of other companies and countries, the slaps on the wrist for massive piracy, the waving of environmental (and other) regulations in order to allow their data centres to be built an operated.

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rafram 6 hours ago | parent [-]

> Even ignoring monetary subsidies

That's what I'm asking - which monetary subsidies?

> not being sued into oblivious by the government for their countless hacks of other companies and countries

That isn't normally how enforcement works, and it hasn't been very long since they disclosed those breaches. If the victims want to pursue legal action, they can, and they still may!

> the slaps on the wrist for massive piracy

So judges and juries are involved in the subsidization conspiracy, too?

> the waving of environmental (and other) regulations in order to allow their data centres to be built an operated

Sure, though if you think this isn't happening in China too, I have a bridge to sell you.

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dghlsakjg 5 hours ago | parent | next [-]

CHIPS act, OBBA, defense, AI upskill grants.

That's just the ones i know off the top of my head in the US. Those programs account for more than 60 billion in committed spend.

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_aavaa_ 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

The original comments is "DeepSeek, and other Chinese models, are heavily subsidised by the Chinese government"

> That's what I'm asking - which monetary subsidies?

I am listing for you the non-monetary subsidies, which are just as real and equally important.

> not being sued into oblivious by the government for their countless hacks of other companies and countries

If it was one of the Chinese labs doing this hacking, the government would be stepping in. If it was European labs they'd be stepping in. If it was you or I the government would be stepping in. That is a massive subsidy (they don't have to worry about the same legal fees and exposure) and being allowed to continue doing business is in fact priceless.

> So judges and juries are involved in the subsidization conspiracy, too?

There is no conspiracy. They are objectively operating by a different set of rules than you or I could operate in this market.

> Sure, though if you think this isn't happening in China too, I have a bridge to sell you.

I never said it wasn't, I'm saying that it's happening here and it's a very real subsidy.

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stickfigure 4 hours ago | parent [-]

> equally important

They really aren't. Nothing in the development of these systems, absolutely nothing, is as important as money. Stop these silly false equivalences.

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_aavaa_ 3 hours ago | parent [-]

These are not silly equivalences.

All the major labs would be dead in the water if the government acted on the things I mentioned. If they treated the labs the way they would have treated us for all those hacks. Or if they enforced pollution measures (or god forbid ban on-prem turbines because of the climate damage). Or rule that training on data is not fair use, or that ingesting GPL3 code and then turning that into weights counts as a derivative work. Or. Or. Or.

Those are all just as important as cash.

	▲	stickfigure 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Nah, nothing here is a special advantage of US firms. The hacks are pretty bland as long as there is no mens rea and the hacked victims do not want to press charges. This isn't a "subsidy", it's just our normal legal process at work. The pollution question is winding its way through court systems and getting a lot of pushback. I wouldn't call this a subsidy, just a slow bureaucracy. And at any rate this isn't special to the US; certainly China's environmental policy is far more lenient. With the training data, again there's nothing specific to US corporations here. Anyone can use that dataset. It's just how our legal system works. You might not like it, but it's the accepted law right now. This doesn't meet any reasonable definition of "subsidy". On the other hand, shoveling billions of dollars of taxpayer funds into corporations is by definition a subsidy. Full stop.