Interesting to consider this inline with recent us export bans, could the US be squandering its lead by giving the open source, largely Chinese labs catch up (in terms of model quality available to masses), will US labs be able to maintain the lead without users being able to use their latest models?
Why do you think this matters? Not that it does or doesn't but what quality does "US WINS" or "CHINA WINS" bring to the table?
Because if enough users switch to the free open Chinese models instead of continuing to pay for last season's American models, the music stops and the bubble pops, and an enormous chunk of the US economy evaporates.
I think the issue matters (not us vs china) due to the investment and exposure normal people have to the valuations of the AI companies. It feels like the US govt could make this the pin that pops the bubble. If these companies loose their lead their value drops and the stock market tanks.
I think the unspoken fear is that if we assume one or the other will "win" in reaching AGI(or whatever threshold of capability), the rest of the world will sooner or later live under their system of rule as a consequence
I very much doubt the primary reason nation states are lining up to permit or forbid access to these systems is 'fear of future AGI dominance'
I think it's much more immediate/present: the weights and the information breach significant strategic controls on national data and posture, which can be back-derived from the models. If you can analyse a model, you can infer what structural inputs dictate it.
Can you expand on that reasoning more? Claude etc has national secrets hodden somewhere in its weights?