Is compute the binding constraint on AI research? Interview with Rebecca Gelles and Ronnie Kinoshita

In their work Resource Democratization: Is Compute the Binding Constraint on AI Research?, presented at AAAI 2024, Rebecca Gelles, Veronica Kinoshita, Micah Musser and James Dunham investigate researchers' access to compute and the impact this has on their work. In this interview, Rebecca and Ronnie tell us about what inspired their study, their methodology and some of their main findings. We wanted to engage directly with AI researchers to understand their resource constraints when deciding what types of research to dedicate their time to. We also wanted to dig deeper and try to understand how resource constraints play out across the AI research community – particularly looking at divides between industry and academia, a popular topic of discussions about AI resource constraints. The reason we were interested in this question is that there's a lot of discourse, particularly from the policy community, about the democratization of AI, addressing inequities in the field, and the fear that progress in AI may be held back by resource constraints.