Local LLMs do have limits, however, and they’re easy to hit. I proved this with a very Tedium-coded challenge involving one of my favorite indie-rock dynasties: “Share with me a story about how Conor Oberst beat Tim Kasher in a trivia game about the history of Omaha.”
All the tests shared a story, but the details were where everything fell flat. Most, not all, of the LLMs were aware that Oberst was the singer of Bright Eyes, but none got close to figuring out which band Kasher led—one said The Decemberists, another said The National. (The answer, of course, is Cursive, or if you’re a real fan, The Good Life.) You don’t trust models with anything factual, of course, but local LLMs are likely more fact-deprived than their server-rack cousins.