#204 - OpenAI Audio, Rubin GPUs, MCP, Zochi
Last Week in AI
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Exploring Block Diffusion in Language Models
This chapter explores the innovative approach of Block Diffusion, combining autoregressive and diffusion models to enhance generation efficiency. It highlights the benefits and limitations of this hybrid method, aiming to improve the scalability of language model outputs.
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Episode notes
Our 204th episode with a summary and discussion of last week's big AI news!
Recorded on 03/21/2025
Hosted by Andrey Kurenkov and Jeremie Harris.
Feel free to email us your questions and feedback at contact@lastweekinai.com and/or hello@gladstone.ai
Read out our text newsletter and comment on the podcast at https://lastweekin.ai/.
Join our Discord here! https://discord.gg/nTyezGSKwP
In this episode:
- Baidu launched two new multimodal models, Ernie 4.5 and Ernie X1, boasting competitive pricing and capabilities compared to Western counterparts like GPT-4.5 and DeepSeek R1.
- OpenAI introduced new audio models, including impressive speech-to-text and text-to-speech systems, and added O1 Pro to their developer API at high costs, reflecting efforts for more profitability.
- Nvidia and Apple announced significant hardware advancements, including Nvidia's future GPU plans and Apple's new Mac Studio offering that can run DeepSeek R1.
- DeepSeek employees are facing travel restrictions, suggesting China is treating its AI development with increased secrecy and urgency, emphasizing a wartime footing in AI competition.
Timestamps + Links:
- (00:00:00) Intro / Banter
- (00:01:36) News Preview
- Tools & Apps
-
- (00:02:50) Baidu launches two new versions of its AI model Ernie
- (00:10:46) OpenAI Unveils New Audio Models to Make AI Agents Sound More Human Than Ever
- (00:16:41) OpenAI’s o1-pro is the company’s most expensive AI model yet
- (00:20:53) Google brings a ‘canvas’ feature to Gemini, plus Audio Overview
- (00:22:18) Anthropic adds web search to its Claude chatbot
- (00:23:55) xAI launches an API for generating images
- Applications & Business
-
- (00:26:28) Nvidia announces Rubin GPUs in 2026, Rubin Ultra in 2027, Feynman also added to roadmap
- (00:36:25) M3 Ultra Runs DeepSeek R1 With 671 Billion Parameters Using 448GB Of Unified Memory, Delivering High Bandwidth Performance At Under 200W Power Consumption, With No Need For A Multi-GPU Setup
- (00:40:07) Intel reaches 'exciting milestone' for 18A 1.8nm-class wafers with first run at Arizona fab
- (00:42:45) Elon Musk’s AI company, xAI, acquires a generative AI video startup
- (00:44:44) Tencent Reportedly Makes Massive NVIDIA H20 Chip Purchase for WeChat’s DeepSeek Integration
- Projects & Open Source
- Research & Advancements
-
- (00:55:58) Sample, Scrutinize and Scale: Effective Inference-Time Search by Scaling Verification
- (01:07:44) Block Diffusion: Interpolating Between Autoregressive and Diffusion Language Models
- (01:12:27) Communication-Efficient Language Model Training Scales Reliably and Robustly: Scaling Laws for DiLoCo
- (01:18:46) Transformers without Normalization
- (01:19:52) Measuring AI Ability to Complete Long Tasks
- (01:26:12) HCAST: Human-Calibrated Autonomy Software Tasks
- Policy & Safety
- Synthetic Media & Art
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