Munich Datageeks September Edition

We are thrilled to announce our next Meetup on September 25th at Netlight.
Format:

• 2 talks (each ca. 40 min incl. discussion)
• Time for networking + food + drinks before, in between and after the presentations
• Talks are held in English
• We will be taking photos and/or film footage at the event. These will be used to share news about our meetups and to publicize upcoming events.

The lineup:
First talk:

Laurens Tetzlaff - Fine-Tuning Language Models: When to customise Language Models for better performance

Abstract:
This talk covers how LLMs changed the way we do and see Data Science, a decision matrix on when to consider what type of GenAI solution as well as in which cases you actually want to fine-tune LLMs. We'll look at practical instruction-based fine-tuning techniques like LoRA/QLoRA and share lessons learned, including common mistakes to avoid.

Bio:
Laurens Tetzlaff is an engineer and scientist specialising in building and scaling data and AI solutions, teams, and organisations. With a background in data science, information systems engineering, and entrepreneurship, he thrives at the intersection of business and technology to create impactful products. At Netlight, Laurens enables clients in the data and AI domain to unlock their full potential while shaping Netlight as a sustainable platform for client impact and personal growth.

Second talk:

Torsten Schön - Backpropagation Boys: How to burn money with AI-generated music

Abstract:
This talk is about how someone with absolutely no musical talent managed to release eight albums within a year. From a first attempt and a somewhat crazy idea, various songs were created that help students better remember the most important points from a lecture and were released under a band called Backpropagation Boys. True to the motto: too lazy to study, better listen to music. Now you can do both. In this talk, I explain how AI music generation works in principle and what the workflow looks like to turn an idea into a song and then release it. You can get an impression of the result here: https://open.spotify.com/intl-de/artist/0CPNzDg9fs3hnbj6pE7piG?si=jHIjSW4JR52z6ZKzgCR2RA

Bio:
Torsten Schön is a research professor for Computer Vision for Intelligent Mobility Systems at the Technische Hochschule Ingolstadt and has terrible taste in music. Since no one wanted to listen to his deathcore metal albums and his students weren't always highly motivated to work through hundreds of lecture slides, he started creating a song for each lecture that captured the key points in the lyrics. In addition to soccer, drawing, and comedy, he has now added another extremely unsuccessful hobby as a music producer to his resume.