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There's no doubt about it, DeepSeek R1 is a Very. Big. Deal. There's a lot of buzz in the AI company, as is the way with a lot of new innovations. But periodically a newbie arrives which actually does have a genuine claim as a significant disruptive force. DeepSeek R1 is such an animal (you can access the model for yourself here).

As reported by CNBC, DeepSeek app has actually already gone beyond ChatGPT as the leading free app in Apple's App Store. And numerous tech giants have seen their stocks take a major hit. This includes Nvidia, which is down 13% today.

On the face of it, it's just a brand-new Chinese AI design, and there's no lack of these releasing weekly. But there are 2 key things which make DeepSeek R1 various.

- What is DeepSeek? - whatever to understand

• DeepSeek's Janus Pro AI image generator is here to handle Midjourney and DALL-E
  
  First, people are discussing it as having the same performance as OpenAI's o1 design. To summarize, o1 is the existing world leader in AI designs, due to the fact that of its capability to reason before giving an answer. This makes it very powerful for more complex tasks, which AI typically battles with.
  
  The reality that a newbie has jumped into contention with the market leader in one go is amazing.
  
  Second, not just is this new design providing almost the exact same efficiency as the o1 design, but it's likewise open source. This means that any AI scientist or engineer throughout the world can work to enhance and tweak it for various applications.
  
  That's a quantum leap in regards to the possible speed of development we're most likely to see in AI over the coming months. This is no longer a circumstance where a couple of companies control the AI space, now there's a big global community which can add to the progress of these fantastic brand-new tools.
  
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  To rub salt in the wound, the DeepSeek family of designs was trained and established in simply two months for a paltry $5.6 million. This compares to the billion dollar development costs of the significant incumbents like OpenAI and Anthropic.
  
  To say it's a slap in the face to these tech giants is an understatement. The Chinese hedge fund owners of DeepSeek, High-Flyer, have a track record in AI development, so it's not a total surprise. What is a surprise is for them to have developed something from scratch so rapidly and inexpensively, and without the benefit of access to state of the art western computing technology.
  
  Of course ranking well on a criteria is something, but the majority of people now try to find real world proof of how models perform on an everyday basis. Early reports recommend that the DeepSeek benchmarks aren't lying, with a variety of users adopting it for AI programs in preference over Anthropic's Claude Sonnet 3.5.
  
  Surprisingly the R1 model even seems to move the goalposts on more innovative pursuits. One Reddit user posted a sample of some creative writing produced by the design, which is shockingly excellent.
  
  Early days for DeepSeek
  
  My own testing suggests that DeepSeek is likewise going to be popular for those desiring to use it locally on their own computer systems. In 3 little, admittedly unscientific, tests I finished with the model I was astonished by how well it did.
  
  In one test I asked the model to help me find a non-profit fundraising platform name I was looking for. A basic Google search, OpenAI and Gemini all stopped working to provide me anywhere near the best answer. DeepSeek hit it in one go, which was staggering.
  
  We are residing in a timeline where a non-US business is keeping the original objective of OpenAI alive - truly open, frontier research study that empowers all. It makes no sense. The most amusing result is the most likely.DeepSeek-R1 not only open-sources a barrage of models but ... pic.twitter.com/M7eZnEmCOYJanuary 20, 2025
  
  It's early days to pass final judgment on this new AI paradigm, however the results so far seem to be extremely promising. One thing I did notice, is the fact that triggering and the system timely are very important when running the model locally.
  
  Without an excellent timely the outcomes are absolutely average, or a minimum of no real advance over existing regional designs. But when it gets it right, my goodness the triggers certainly do fly.
  
  More from Tom's Guide
  
  I checked Meta AI vs Perplexity AI with 7 prompts - here's the winner
  I compose for a living - and this AI transcription software is a real game changer
  Leaked memo reveals Apple's AI strategies for 2025 - this is what the business is concentrating on

Nigel Powell is an author, writer, and specialist with over 30 years of experience in the technology industry. He produced the weekly Don't Panic technology column in the Sunday Times newspaper for 16 years and is the author of the Sunday Times book of Computer Answers, published by Harper Collins. He has been a technology pundit on Sky Television's Global Village program and a regular contributor to BBC Radio 5's Men's Hour.

He has an Honours degree in law (LLB) and a Master's Degree in Business Administration (MBA), and his work has actually made him a specialist in all things software application, AI, security, privacy, mobile, and other tech developments. Nigel currently lives in West London and enjoys spending time practicing meditation and listening to music.

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