Kevin Roose

So great to be here.

So great to be here.

So the freakout really started in earnest with a Chinese AI company called DeepSeek. And DeepSeek had released a new AI model. You know, models are released all the time. Generally, they don't make international news. But this model was different in a few ways.

So the freakout really started in earnest with a Chinese AI company called DeepSeek. And DeepSeek had released a new AI model. You know, models are released all the time. Generally, they don't make international news. But this model was different in a few ways.

One of them was that it just appeared to be a really good model, like better than the leading Chinese models at the time and on par or close to on par with the leading American models.

One of them was that it just appeared to be a really good model, like better than the leading Chinese models at the time and on par or close to on par with the leading American models.

And so the DeepSeek app.

And so the DeepSeek app.

Goes to number one on the App Store charts. It vaults ahead of ChatGPT and all these better known apps.

Goes to number one on the App Store charts. It vaults ahead of ChatGPT and all these better known apps.

And the more notable thing, the thing that really caused the American AI industry to start to panic was how cheaply this model appeared to have been built.

And the more notable thing, the thing that really caused the American AI industry to start to panic was how cheaply this model appeared to have been built.

So we think that this model cost DeepSeek about $5.5 million to train. Now, that might sound like a lot of money, but it's really not compared to what many of the American AI companies are spending. Meta said that it was spending $65 billion.

So we think that this model cost DeepSeek about $5.5 million to train. Now, that might sound like a lot of money, but it's really not compared to what many of the American AI companies are spending. Meta said that it was spending $65 billion.

Microsoft says it plans to spend about $80 billion. Microsoft said it was spending $80 billion.

Microsoft says it plans to spend about $80 billion. Microsoft said it was spending $80 billion.

And OpenAI had just announced this giant partnership where they were planning to spend up to half a trillion over the next four years. As much as half a trillion dollars to build the infrastructure for AI. Whoa. Yeah, it's wild.

And OpenAI had just announced this giant partnership where they were planning to spend up to half a trillion over the next four years. As much as half a trillion dollars to build the infrastructure for AI. Whoa. Yeah, it's wild.

And on top of that, DeepSeek says that they built their model without access to the latest and greatest American AI chips, which up until now were thought to be necessary to build the most powerful models.

And on top of that, DeepSeek says that they built their model without access to the latest and greatest American AI chips, which up until now were thought to be necessary to build the most powerful models.