Scrapyard AI

TL;DR

This paper explores how obsolete AI models, discarded in a 'scrapyard', can be repurposed for resource-efficient experimentation and societal impact, exemplified by Project Nudge-x.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of AI model scrapyards as a resource for frugal AI research and demonstrates this through the Nudge-x project.

Findings

Obsolete AI models can be reconfigured for new applications.

AI scrapyards enable resource-constrained experimentation.

Nudge-x uses legacy models to analyze environmental impacts.

Abstract

This paper considers AI model churn as an opportunity for frugal investigation of large AI models. It describes how the incessant push for ever more powerful AI systems leaves in its wake a collection of obsolete yet powerful AI models, discarded in a veritable scrapyard of AI production. This scrapyard offers a potent opportunity for resource-constrained experimentation into AI systems. As in the physical scrapyard, nothing ever truly disappears in the AI scrapyard, it is just waiting to be reconfigured into something else. Project Nudge-x is an example of what can emerge from the AI scrapyard. Nudge-x seeks to manipulate legacy AI models to describe how mining sites across the planet are impacting landscapes and lives. By sharing this collection of brutal landscape interventions with people and AI systems alike, Nudge-x creates a venue for the appreciation of a history sadly shared between AI and people.