What the history of the web can teach us about the future of AI

Blog post: https://explosion.ai/blog/history-web-future-ai
Video: https://www.youtube.com/live/kpocg6b89Fs?si=pmNN1kX5GJCe1vke&t=3840

Recent advancements in Generative AI are exciting, and will surely have a significant, yet uncertain impact on the future. Are we still going to need developers going forward, or will they be replaced by AI? Is Big Tech monopolizing the technology? And will we become entirely dependent on API providers, sacrificing the spirit of open-source software and data privacy? I believe there is a lot we can learn from another groundbreaking technology: the web. In this talk, I'll show you what the history of the web can teach us about the future of artificial intelligence, and what this means for developers, models, open source and regulation.

1. Ines Montani Explosion What the history of the web can teach us about the future of AI
2. I started with the web…
3. ines.io/blog/how-i-started-coding I started with the web…
4. ines.io/blog/how-i-started-coding My Blog 2006 - 2009 I started with the web…
5. ines.io/blog/how-i-started-coding My Blog 2006 - 2009 I CSS I started with the web…
6. displaCy ines.io/blog/how-i-started-coding My Blog 2006 - 2009 I CSS I started with the web…
7. displaCy ines.io/blog/how-i-started-coding I NLP … and still love it today! My Blog 2006 - 2009 I CSS I started with the web…
8. Open-source library for industrial-strength natural language processing spacy.io spaCy 320m+ DOWNLOADS
9. Open-source library for industrial-strength natural language processing spacy.io spaCy ChatGPT can write spaCy code! 320m+ DOWNLOADS
10. Prodigy Modern scriptable annotation tool for machine learning developers prodigy.ai 900+ COMPANIES 10k+ USERS
11. Prodigy Modern scriptable annotation tool for machine learning developers prodigy.ai 900+ COMPANIES 10k+ USERS Alex Smith Developer Kim Miller Analyst GPT-4 API
12. 0 % 20 % 40 % 60 % Data Analysis Web Dev Machine Learning DevOps Parsing / Scraping Python Developers Survey 2023 Python usage
13. 0 % 20 % 40 % 60 % Data Analysis Web Dev Machine Learning DevOps Parsing / Scraping Python Developers Survey 2023 Python usage Web Development Machine Learning Data Analysis Research Education DevOps Data Engineering 0 % 25 % Python Developers Survey 2023 What do you use Python for the most?
14. 0 % 20 % 40 % 60 % Data Analysis Web Dev Machine Learning DevOps Parsing / Scraping Python Developers Survey 2023 Python usage Web Development Machine Learning Data Analysis Research Education DevOps Data Engineering 0 % 25 % Python Developers Survey 2023 What do you use Python for the most? Python wins for AI because it’s a general- purpose language
15. Big Tech is reinventing the wheel and the road spacy.fyi/ltwc Reinvent the wheel, but don’t reinvent the road!
16. Big Tech is reinventing the wheel and the road Google most-used search engine with market share of over 80% spacy.fyi/ltwc Reinvent the wheel, but don’t reinvent the road!
17. Big Tech is reinventing the wheel and the road Google most-used search engine with market share of over 80% Chrome / Chromium most popular browser and engine powering Microsoft Edge, Opera, Arc and more spacy.fyi/ltwc Reinvent the wheel, but don’t reinvent the road!
18. Big Tech is reinventing the wheel and the road Google most-used search engine with market share of over 80% Chrome / Chromium most popular browser and engine powering Microsoft Edge, Opera, Arc and more Gemini (formerly Bard) generative AI model and chat bot integrated into search spacy.fyi/ltwc Reinvent the wheel, but don’t reinvent the road!
19. Big Tech is reinventing the wheel and the road Accelerated Mobile Pages open-source framework for faster mobile browsing, encouraged for best search results Google most-used search engine with market share of over 80% Chrome / Chromium most popular browser and engine powering Microsoft Edge, Opera, Arc and more Gemini (formerly Bard) generative AI model and chat bot integrated into search spacy.fyi/ltwc Reinvent the wheel, but don’t reinvent the road!
20. Big Tech is reinventing the wheel and the road Accelerated Mobile Pages open-source framework for faster mobile browsing, encouraged for best search results Google most-used search engine with market share of over 80% Chrome / Chromium most popular browser and engine powering Microsoft Edge, Opera, Arc and more Gemini (formerly Bard) generative AI model and chat bot integrated into search Google Ads search advertising generating $200b+ revenue per year spacy.fyi/ltwc Reinvent the wheel, but don’t reinvent the road!
22. Will Big Tech monopolize AI?
23. Will Big Tech monopolize AI? What about open- source software?
24. Are we still going to need developers? Will Big Tech monopolize AI? What about open- source software?
25. Are we still going to need developers? Will Big Tech monopolize AI? What about open- source software? Will AI developers be replaced by AI?
26. Are we still going to need developers? Will we become dependent on API providers? Will Big Tech monopolize AI? What about open- source software? Will AI developers be replaced by AI?
27. Are we still going to need developers? Will we become dependent on API providers? Will Big Tech monopolize AI? How do we keep our data private? What about open- source software? Will AI developers be replaced by AI?
28. Are we still going to need developers? What can we learn from the past? Will we become dependent on API providers? Will Big Tech monopolize AI? How do we keep our data private? What about open- source software? Will AI developers be replaced by AI?
29. Don’t confuse raising the floor with raising 
 the ceiling.
30. ceiling floor
31. ceiling floor local store sets up website without requiring help from a web developer 🛍 +10% customers and revenue
32. ceiling floor local store sets up website without requiring help from a web developer 🛍 +10% customers and revenue todo list app adds automated translation feature using an API 🤖 +5% international user growth
33. ceiling floor streaming service makes web player 1ms faster 📺 +3% time spent in app local store sets up website without requiring help from a web developer 🛍 +10% customers and revenue todo list app adds automated translation feature using an API 🤖 +5% international user growth
34. ceiling floor hotel booking platform improves recommendation system 💸 +0.5% click-through rate, +$1m revenue streaming service makes web player 1ms faster 📺 +3% time spent in app local store sets up website without requiring help from a web developer 🛍 +10% customers and revenue todo list app adds automated translation feature using an API 🤖 +5% international user growth
35. ceiling floor hotel booking platform improves recommendation system 💸 +0.5% click-through rate, +$1m revenue streaming service makes web player 1ms faster 📺 +3% time spent in app local store sets up website without requiring help from a web developer 🛍 +10% customers and revenue todo list app adds automated translation feature using an API 🤖 +5% international user growth high adoption
36. ceiling floor hotel booking platform improves recommendation system 💸 +0.5% click-through rate, +$1m revenue streaming service makes web player 1ms faster 📺 +3% time spent in app local store sets up website without requiring help from a web developer 🛍 +10% customers and revenue todo list app adds automated translation feature using an API 🤖 +5% international user growth high value high adoption
37. ceiling floor
38. ceiling floor website builders
39. ceiling floor website builders frameworks
40. ceiling floor website builders browsers frameworks
41. ceiling floor website builders browsers web standards frameworks
42. ceiling floor website builders browsers web standards AI features frameworks
43. ceiling floor website builders browsers web standards AI features frameworks frameworks
44. ceiling floor website builders browsers web standards AI features frameworks frameworks environment
45. ceiling floor website builders browsers web standards AI features frameworks frameworks environment techniques
46. High-value use cases are worth development effort.
47. real-time commodities trading insights by extracting structured attributes explosion.ai/blog/sp-global-commodities S&P Global CASE STUDY 99% F-SCORE 6mb MODEL SIZE 16k+ WORDS / S
48. real-time commodities trading insights by extracting structured attributes high-security environment explosion.ai/blog/sp-global-commodities S&P Global CASE STUDY 99% F-SCORE 6mb MODEL SIZE 16k+ WORDS / S
49. real-time commodities trading insights by extracting structured attributes high-security environment used LLM during annotation explosion.ai/blog/sp-global-commodities S&P Global CASE STUDY 99% F-SCORE 6mb MODEL SIZE 16k+ WORDS / S
50. real-time commodities trading insights by extracting structured attributes high-security environment used LLM during annotation 10× data development speedup with humans and model in the loop explosion.ai/blog/sp-global-commodities S&P Global CASE STUDY 99% F-SCORE 6mb MODEL SIZE 16k+ WORDS / S
51. real-time commodities trading insights by extracting structured attributes high-security environment used LLM during annotation 10× data development speedup with humans and model in the loop 8+ market pipelines in production explosion.ai/blog/sp-global-commodities S&P Global CASE STUDY 99% F-SCORE 6mb MODEL SIZE 16k+ WORDS / S
52. real-time commodities trading insights by extracting structured attributes high-security environment used LLM during annotation 10× data development speedup with humans and model in the loop 8+ market pipelines in production explosion.ai/blog/sp-global-commodities S&P Global CASE STUDY 99% F-SCORE 6mb MODEL SIZE 16k+ WORDS / S
53. ceiling floor 🔮 Human-in-the-loop distillation explosion.ai/blog/human-in-the-loop-distillation 🔮 LLM
54. ceiling floor 🔮 Human-in-the-loop distillation explosion.ai/blog/human-in-the-loop-distillation continuous evaluation baseline 🔮 LLM
55. ceiling floor 🔮 Human-in-the-loop distillation explosion.ai/blog/human-in-the-loop-distillation continuous evaluation baseline 🔮 LLM prompting
56. ceiling floor 🔮 Human-in-the-loop distillation explosion.ai/blog/human-in-the-loop-distillation continuous evaluation baseline 🔮 LLM prompting Prodigy
57. ceiling floor 🔮 Human-in-the-loop distillation explosion.ai/blog/human-in-the-loop-distillation continuous evaluation baseline 🔮 LLM prompting 📦 component transfer learning Prodigy
58. ceiling floor 🔮 Human-in-the-loop distillation explosion.ai/blog/human-in-the-loop-distillation continuous evaluation baseline 🔮 LLM prompting 📦 component transfer learning distilled model Prodigy
59. ceiling floor 🔮 Human-in-the-loop distillation explosion.ai/blog/human-in-the-loop-distillation continuous evaluation baseline 🔮 LLM prompting 📦 component transfer learning distilled model Prodigy deploy 🚀
60. The development process lets you take back control.
61. Development workflows over time
62. static pages Development workflows over time
63. static pages dynamic pages Development workflows over time
64. static pages dynamic pages static pages Development workflows over time
65. static pages dynamic pages static pages Development workflows over time compile static data at build time
66. static pages custom models dynamic pages static pages Development workflows over time compile static data at build time
67. static pages custom models dynamic pages static pages pretrained models Development workflows over time compile static data at build time
68. static pages custom models dynamic pages static pages custom models pretrained models Development workflows over time compile static data at build time
69. static pages custom models dynamic pages static pages custom models distill models into smaller, faster and private components pretrained models Development workflows over time compile static data at build time
70. AI products are more than just a model spacy.fyi/ai-revolution How open-source beats economies of scale, even for LLMs
71. AI products are more than just a model machine-facing models GPT-4 human-facing systems ChatGPT spacy.fyi/ai-revolution How open-source beats economies of scale, even for LLMs
72. AI products are more than just a model machine-facing models GPT-4 human-facing systems ChatGPT most important di ff erentiation is product, not just technology spacy.fyi/ai-revolution How open-source beats economies of scale, even for LLMs
73. AI products are more than just a model machine-facing models GPT-4 human-facing systems ChatGPT UI / UX marketing customization most important di ff erentiation is product, not just technology spacy.fyi/ai-revolution How open-source beats economies of scale, even for LLMs
74. AI products are more than just a model machine-facing models GPT-4 human-facing systems ChatGPT UI / UX marketing customization most important di ff erentiation is product, not just technology swappable components based on research, impacts are quantifiable spacy.fyi/ai-revolution How open-source beats economies of scale, even for LLMs
75. AI products are more than just a model machine-facing models GPT-4 human-facing systems ChatGPT UI / UX marketing customization speed accuracy latency cost most important di ff erentiation is product, not just technology swappable components based on research, impacts are quantifiable spacy.fyi/ai-revolution How open-source beats economies of scale, even for LLMs
76. AI products are more than just a model machine-facing models GPT-4 human-facing systems ChatGPT UI / UX marketing customization speed accuracy latency cost But what about the data? most important di ff erentiation is product, not just technology swappable components based on research, impacts are quantifiable spacy.fyi/ai-revolution How open-source beats economies of scale, even for LLMs
77. AI products are more than just a model machine-facing models GPT-4 human-facing systems ChatGPT UI / UX marketing customization speed accuracy latency cost But what about the data? User data is an advantage for product, not the foundation for machine-facing tasks. most important di ff erentiation is product, not just technology swappable components based on research, impacts are quantifiable spacy.fyi/ai-revolution How open-source beats economies of scale, even for LLMs
78. AI products are more than just a model machine-facing models GPT-4 human-facing systems ChatGPT UI / UX marketing customization speed accuracy latency cost But what about the data? User data is an advantage for product, not the foundation for machine-facing tasks. You don’t need specific data to gain general knowledge. most important di ff erentiation is product, not just technology swappable components based on research, impacts are quantifiable spacy.fyi/ai-revolution How open-source beats economies of scale, even for LLMs
79. 🔮 👩💻 ⚠ 🎁
80. 🔮 Developers Don’t confuse raising the floor with raising the ceiling. 👩💻 ⚠ 🎁
81. 🔮 Developers Don’t confuse raising the floor with raising the ceiling. 👩💻 ⚠ 🎁 high-value use cases are worth development e ort
82. Models Take back control in the development process. 🔮 Developers Don’t confuse raising the floor with raising the ceiling. 👩💻 ⚠ 🎁 high-value use cases are worth development e ort
83. compile smaller, faster and private models at development time Models Take back control in the development process. 🔮 Developers Don’t confuse raising the floor with raising the ceiling. 👩💻 ⚠ 🎁 high-value use cases are worth development e ort
84. compile smaller, faster and private models at development time Interoperability is the opposite of monopoly. Open Source Models Take back control in the development process. 🔮 Developers Don’t confuse raising the floor with raising the ceiling. 👩💻 ⚠ 🎁 high-value use cases are worth development e ort
85. compile smaller, faster and private models at development time LLMs can be one part of a product or process, and swapped Interoperability is the opposite of monopoly. Open Source Models Take back control in the development process. 🔮 Developers Don’t confuse raising the floor with raising the ceiling. 👩💻 ⚠ 🎁 high-value use cases are worth development e ort
86. compile smaller, faster and private models at development time LLMs can be one part of a product or process, and swapped Interoperability is the opposite of monopoly. Open Source Regulation should focus on products and actions, not components. Regulation Models Take back control in the development process. 🔮 Developers Don’t confuse raising the floor with raising the ceiling. 👩💻 ⚠ 🎁 high-value use cases are worth development e ort
87. Thank you! LinkedIn Explosion spaCy Prodigy Twitter Mastodon Bluesky explosion.ai spacy.io prodigy.ai @_inesmontani @ines@sigmoid.social @inesmontani.bsky.social