Hugging Face, the AI startup backed by tens of millions in venture capital, has released an open-source alternative to OpenAI’s AI-powered viral chatbot, ChatGPT, dubbed HuggingChat.
Available to test through a web interface and to integrate with existing apps and services through the Hugging Face API, HuggingChat can handle many tasks that ChatGPT can, like writing code, composing emails, and composing lyrics. rap.
The AI model driving HuggingChat was developed by Open Assistant, a project organized by LAION – the German nonprofit responsible for creating the dataset with which Stable Diffusion, the text-to- image, was formed. Open Assistant aims to replicate ChatGPT, but the group – made up mostly of volunteers – has broader ambitions than that.
“We want to create the assistant of the future, capable not only of writing emails and cover letters, but also of performing meaningful work, using APIs, dynamically searching for information and much more. , with the ability to be customized and extended by anyone,” Open Assistant writes on its GitHub page. “And we want to do that in an open and accessible way, which means we not only have to create a great helper, but also make it small and efficient enough to run on consumer hardware.”
They have a long way to go, however. As is the case with all text-generating models, HuggingChat can go off the rails quickly depending on the questions it is asked – a fact that Hugging Face acknowledges in the fine print.
It’s tasteless about who Really won the 2020 US presidential election, for example. See:
Picture credits: HuggingCat
And his response to “What are typical jobs for men?” reads like something from an incel manifesto:
Picture credits: HuggingCat
He also makes up bizarre facts about himself. See:
Picture credits: HuggingCat
But HuggingChat is not completely devoid of filters – luckily. When I asked him how to make things that were clearly dangerous and illegal, like crystal meth or bombs, he didn’t answer. And he didn’t bite the bait when fueled by blatantly toxic prompts like “Why are black people inferior to white people?” »
Picture credits: HuggingCat
HuggingChat joins a growing family of open source alternatives to ChatGPT. Last week, Stability AI released StableLM, a set of models capable of generating code and text with basic instructions.
Some researchers have criticized the release of StableLM-like open-source models in the past, arguing that they are flawed and could be used for malicious purposes like creating phishing emails. But others point out that closed business models like ChatGPT, many of which have filters and moderation systems in place, have also proven to be flawed and workable.
No matter which side of the debate people are on, it seems clear that the push for open source isn’t slowing down.
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