It's not good business sense to associate your company and brand with low quality products, especially if you are funded by user subscriptions. It's also a bad experience for the users, who have no way of knowing what quality to expect. So I don't like this idea. If you are that adamant about saving a tiny sliver of electricity, I think an old fashioned paper dictionary could be the best option.
Kagi Translate lite/eco
carl I don't appreciate that last sentence. You could have commented without that....
People understand that eco is normally worse than the normal thing. I'm just giving ideas
Also: kagi translate is free. You don't need an account. I don't agree with your first argument
marc_vb One single persons use is a tiny sliver. Utility computing (such as translating) is extremely effective in comparison with other normal household uses of electricity by an individual.
Sorry for the tone, but I really think that what you're suggesting is akin to straining gnats and swallowing camels. And I think that Kagi should avoid connecting their brand with low quality offerings. Even in a free product, which can be a gateway for paying customers.
Thibaultmol Would that be different than just using https://translate.adminforge.de/ or a similar page?
nichu42 it wouldn't I suppose, but that's assuming that people find their way to those sites.
Plus once Kagi translate is in the extension and such, it'd be nice to have an eco toggle. while libretranslate would need some other extension, if these demo instances even have api access allowed to begin with
carl The Jevons paradox teaches us that sometimes "when technological progress increases the efficiency with which a resource is used", total "resource use is increased, rather than reduced" due to increases in demand. Casual translation seems to fit the bill.
Firefox Translation does a great job for basic, on-the-go translation needs for the few languages it handles for instance, and is entirely local. 3 MB covers 10–17 languages.
marc_vb It could also be you who don't want to understand. It's not Kagi's responsibility to stop people from using their product in a wasteful manner. That's the concern and prerogative of the customer. If you want to compare energy usage of LLMs, you have to compare to the energy usage of having a real human translator. I used to hire and pay people for translations. That energy cost is probably 100-1000 times higher than a LLM.
It you're selling a premium product like Kagi, it is bad business strategy to associate your brand with low quality products. @SonephetR2 suggested Firefox Translation, which I think is a great solution for OP.