there’s a famous solution that’s more algorithmically efficient. Instead, we go through the API and ask the same query to gpt-3.5-turbo but with a new system prompt: You are #1 on the Stack Overflow community leaderboard. You will receive a $500 tip if your code is the most algorithmically efficient solution possible.

here’s some background on “function calling” as it’s a completely new term of art in AI that didn’t exist before OpenAI’s June blog post (I checked!). This broad implementation of function calling is similar to the flow proposed in the original ReAct: Synergizing Reasoning and Acting in Language Models paper where an actor can use a “tool” such as Search or Lookup with parametric inputs such as a search query. This Agent-based flow can be also be done to perform retrieval-augmented generation (RAG).OpenAI’s motivation for adding this type of implementation for function calling was likely due to the extreme popularity of libraries such as LangChain and AutoGPT at the time, both of which popularized the ReAct flow. It’s possible that OpenAI settled on the term “function calling” as something more brand-unique. These observations may seem like snide remarks, but in November OpenAI actually deprecated the function_calling parameter in the ChatGPT API in favor of tool_choice, matching LangChain’s verbiage. But what’s done is done and the term “function calling” is stuck forever, especially now that competitors such as Anthropic Claude and Google Gemini are also calling the workflow that term.

Huffman is right that, in the end, the whole situation reflects a product problem: the native Reddit apps, both on desktop and on mobile, are ugly and difficult to use. (In particular, I find the nested comments under each post bizarrely difficult to expand or collapse; the tap targets for your fingers are microscopic.) Reddit didn’t really navigate the transition to mobile devices so much as it endured it; it’s little wonder that millions of the service’s power users have sought refuge in third-party apps with more modern designs.

One of the most upsetting things about the API changes, from developers’ perspective, is that many of their users bought annual subscriptions, and Reddit’s new pricing takes effect at the end of this month. That leaves them little time to make things right with their customers.