How to choose a model for your app
Pick by the work, the budget and the data, in that order.
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When a small model beats a frontier one
A cheap model wins when the task is narrow enough to check automatically. The check is the thing that makes the downgrade safe.
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The three questions that pick a model
What a wrong answer costs, what one task costs, and what may leave your network. Ask them in that order and the model list gets short fast.