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points by saberience 1 day ago | 0 comments

The Google naming convention is so nonsensical it's comical.

With Anthropic and OpenAI, it's obvious immediately which are the better models. I.e. Sol is better than Luna, or Mythos is better than Fable.

But Google, let's pick Argon, which to most folks means mostly nothing. And then... Carbon! So which is better, Argon or Carbon? Nobody fucking knows. Plus neither sounds cool or viral or mysterious or even provokes curiosity.

When Fable was first leaked it sounded different and intriguing... Carbon just sounds... boring.

[–] flowerlad 1 day ago

> it's obvious immediately which are the better models. I.e. Sol is better than Luna, or Mythos is better than Fable.

It is not obvious to me at all. I like Apple's naming more: iPhone Pro Max is better than iPhone Pro which is better than iPhone.

Sol vs Luna, how am I supposed to know which is better? Is sol a word, what does it mean? Same with mythos and fable. How am I supposed to keep track of these names across multiple companies? Why can't they use Claude vs. Claude Pro vs. Claude Pro Max?

[–] aleksiy123 1 day ago

Yeah I think the op is overestimating the effort it take to order them properly especially cross culture.

The ordering seems to be based on size?

I actually like the google one. Alphabetical categories. Essentially alpha beta without the existing connation.

I think the bigger problem it’s getting harder to order models linearly. As later versions of the model make different tradeoffs across dimensions.

[–] crazysim 1 day ago

I mean, I can explain Sol vs Luna. Sol is the sun, it's huge. Luna is a moon, it's small. Terra is earth, in-between.

[–] flowerlad 1 day ago

Sol means "sun" in Spanish and Portuguese, but that wasn't obvious to me as an English speaker, I had to look that up after you said Sol is the sun.

[–] sergiotapia 1 day ago

That korean dude ruined pro max for me forever lol

[–] vatsachak 1 day ago

Yeah whoever names these things at Google needs to be fired.

Mythos -> Fable -(sketchy)-> Opus -> Sonnet -> Haiku mostly checks out

Astra -> Sol -> Terra -> Luna checks out

Carbon ?? Argon

[–] Andrex 1 day ago

I feel like I focus on the version numbers and Flash label for Gemini more than the attached cutesey codenames.

4 > 3.8 > 3.1 > 3.0

Unless you put Flash onto it, which denotes a lower cost version.

It seems like Carbon is a drop in replacement for Argon (same price). They can keep using random cutesey names as long as the version number + Flash naming scheme keeps making sense. Feels Android-y to me.

[–] thway15269037 1 day ago

Someone in some previous thread tried to summarize, e.g. "Sol < Astra, except when 6.1 Sol which is more that current Astra, but Terra 6.1 > Sol latest, and..."

So no, OAI scheme is also confusing as hell. And they are going to add even more confusion when they release presumably Nova.

[–] 5555watch 1 day ago

Argon is gas, and Carbon is a solid? But I don't see an obvious progression afterwards

[–] crazysim 1 day ago

I wish they would just call it 4.1 .

[–] acoustics 1 day ago

Seems to be alphabetical

[–] gengelbro 1 day ago

> I.e. Sol is better than Luna, or Mythos is better than Fable.

Oh yeah incredibly clear that a mythos is better than a fable /s

[–] aleksiy123 1 day ago

I think it’s relative size of literary work.

Mythos > Fable ? Opus > Sonnet > Haiku

Tho I think it’s definitely not obvious at first glance. And requires some thinking to order if you are even familiar with the terms in the first place (I had to look up opus)

[–] saberience 1 day ago

Mythology implies gods etc, Fable implies a something more like a fairy story.

That's fairly obvious to me. Most people associate Myth with the gods, which are kind of the biggest and most powerful things we can imagine.

Not so much of a stretch...