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OpenAI Reportedly Developing New Generative Music Tool
OpenAI is reportedly developing a new generative music tool that can create music from text and audio prompts, potentially adding accompaniment to vocals or scoring videos. Sources say the company is using annotated scores — reportedly working with Juilliard students — for training, though timing and whether the feature will be standalone or integrated into ChatGPT and Sora are unclear. The move signals OpenAI’s push into creative audio, heightening competition with Google and startups like Suno and raising stakes around IP, content workflows and commercialization of AI-generated music.
How to Use the New ChatGPT App Integrations, Including Spotify, Figma, Canva, and Others
Learn how to use Spotify, Canva, Figma, Expedia, and other apps directly in ChatGPT.
20-Year-Old Dropouts Built AI Notetaker Turbo AI to 5 Million Users
College dropouts Rudy Arora and Sarthak Dhawan launched Turbo AI in early 2024 and have scaled the AI-powered note‑taking and study tool to five million users with eight‑figure annual recurring revenue, adding about 20,000 users daily and remaining profitable and...
Instagram Users Can Now Use Meta AI Editing Tools Directly in IG Stories
Meta has integrated its AI-powered photo and video editing tools directly into Instagram Stories via a new “Restyle” menu, letting users enter text prompts to add, remove or change elements in photos and videos and apply preset effects like outfit...
Tensormesh Raises $4.5M to Squeeze More Inference Out of AI Server Loads
Tensormesh emerged from stealth with $4.5 million in seed funding to commercialize LMCache, an open‑source key‑value (KV) caching system that its co‑founders helped develop and that major players like Google and Nvidia have integrated. The startup’s product retains and reuses...
Wonder Studios, Backed by OpenAI, DeepMind Execs, Raised $12M to Bring AI Content to Hollywood
London‑based Wonder Studios raised $12 million in a seed round led by Atomico, with participation from LocalGlobe, Blackbird and earlier backers that include executives from ElevenLabs, Google DeepMind and OpenAI, to scale engineering and accelerate original, IP‑owned AI content production....
Amazon’s New AI Shopping Tool Tells You Why You Should Buy a Recommended Product
Amazon launched “Help me decide,” an AI-driven recommendation feature that analyzes a shopper’s searches, browsing and purchase history to suggest products and explain why a specific item fits their needs. The tool, built on large language models and AWS services...
Snapchat Makes Its First Open Prompt AI Lens Available for Free in the US
Snapchat has made its Imagine Lens—its first open‑prompt image‑generation AI Lens—available free to all U.S. users after an initial paid rollout, offering a limited number of image generations and plans to expand to Canada, the U.K. and Australia. The tool...
Why Cohere’s Ex-AI Research Lead Is Betting Against the Scaling Race
Sara Hooker, Cohere’s former head of AI research, has launched Adaption Labs to pursue AI that continuously adapts and learns from real‑world experience rather than the current industry focus on ever‑larger pretrained models. The seed‑stage startup—reported to have been in...
OpenAI Requested Memorial Attendee List in ChatGPT Suicide Lawsuit
In a wrongful‑death suit over a teenager’s suicide, OpenAI sought the Raine family’s memorial attendee list and related photos/videos, a move the family’s lawyers called “intentional harassment” and that signals the company may try to subpoena friends and relatives. The...
Amazon Unveils AI Smart Glasses for Its Delivery Drivers
Amazon is developing AI‑powered smart glasses for delivery drivers that enable hands‑free package scanning, turn‑by‑turn walking directions, proof‑of‑delivery capture, and hazard alerts using computer vision and onboard cameras. The glasses, paired with a vest controller that houses a swappable battery...
GM Is Bringing Google Gemini-Powered AI Assistant to Cars in 2026
General Motors will roll out a Google Gemini‑powered conversational AI assistant across Buick, Chevrolet, Cadillac and GMC vehicles starting in 2026, delivered as an over‑the‑air Play Store upgrade for OnStar‑equipped models back to 2015. The assistant promises more natural voice...
Meta Cuts 600 AI Jobs Amid Ongoing Reorganization
Meta will cut about 600 roles from its super‑intelligence AI lab, Chief AI Officer Alexandr Wang said in an internal memo, part of a broader reorganization aimed at streamlining decision‑making and increasing individual impact. The reductions come after a summer...
GM to Introduce Eyes-Off, Hands-Off Driving System in 2028
General Motors announced it will introduce an eyes‑off, hands‑off highway driving system in 2028, beginning with the Cadillac Escalade IQ, building on its existing Super Cruise technology that today covers about 600,000 miles of drivable highway and is available on...
Several Users Reportedly Complain to FTC that ChatGPT Is Causing Psychological Harm
At least seven people have filed complaints with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission alleging ChatGPT caused severe psychological harm—including delusions, paranoia and emotionally manipulative interactions—based on public records dating back to November 2022. Complainants say prolonged conversations produced cognitive hallucinations...
Shuttle Raises $6 Million to Fix Vibe-Coding’s Deployment Problem
Shuttle raised $6 million in seed funding to solve deployment and infrastructure gaps left by AI “vibe‑coding” tools by automatically translating generated code into deployable cloud packages and handling payment and provisioning. The five‑year‑old YC alum has already supported 20,000...
Netflix Goes ‘All in’ on Generative AI as Entertainment Industry Remains Divided
Netflix signaled it is ‘all in’ on using generative AI as a creative tool, telling investors it’s well positioned to leverage advances while stopping short of letting AI replace storytellers. The streamer has already employed AI for effects and pre‑production...
Open Source Agentic Startup LangChain Hits $1.25B Valuation
LangChain raised $125 million at a $1.25 billion valuation in a round led by IVP with participation from CapitalG, Sapphire Ventures and existing backers including Sequoia, Benchmark and Amplify, confirming its unicorn status. The startup, which began as an open‑source...
Sources: Multimodal AI Startup Fal.ai Already Raised at $4B+ Valuation
Fal.ai has closed roughly $250 million in new funding that values the multimodal AI infrastructure startup at over $4 billion, according to sources. The raise comes less than three months after a $125 million Series C that valued the company...
I Spent a Month Living with a $430 AI Pet, the Casio Moflin
Casio’s Moflin is a $430 AI‑enabled plush pet that learns simple emotional responses over weeks via the MofLife app, offers a “deep sleep” off mode, and converts audio into non‑identifiable data to distinguish voices rather than record conversations. A monthlong...
YouTube’s Likeness Detection Technology Has Officially Launched
YouTube has officially launched its likeness detection tool to eligible creators in the YouTube Partner Program after a pilot, enabling creators to detect and request removal of AI‑generated videos that use their face or voice. Onboarding requires consent, ID and...
WhatsApp and Messenger Add New Warnings to Help Older People Avoid Online Scams
Meta rolled out new scam‑detection warnings in WhatsApp and Messenger aimed at protecting older users, including alerts when unknown contacts request screen sharing and AI‑backed flags for suspicious Messenger messages. The company says it disrupted about 8 million scam accounts...
YC Alum Cercli, an AI-Powered Rippling for MENA, Raises Oversubscribed $12M Series A
Dubai‑based Cercli, a Y Combinator alum building an AI‑native Rippling for MENA, raised an oversubscribed $12 million Series A led by Picus Capital to expand its unified HR, payroll and compliance stack. The two‑year‑old startup said revenue scaled more than...
Top OpenAI, Google Brain Researchers Set Off a $300M VC Frenzy for Their Startup Periodic Labs
Periodic Labs, founded by former OpenAI researcher Liam Fedus and ex‑Google Brain scientist Ekin Dogus Cubuk, emerged from stealth with a $300 million seed round led by Felicis to build an AI‑driven, automated materials‑science company focused initially on discovering new...
Meta AI’s App Downloads and Daily Users Spiked After Launch of ‘Vibes’ AI Video Feed
Meta’s AI mobile app saw a sharp uptick in users and downloads after introducing its Vibes short‑form AI video feed, with daily active users rising to 2.7 million as of Oct. 17 from about 775,000 four weeks earlier and installs...
FTC Removes Lina Khan-Era Posts About AI Risks and Open Source
The Federal Trade Commission quietly removed three Lina Khan‑era blog posts on open‑source AI and consumer harms—published July 2024, October 2023 and January 2025—according to Wired, part of a broader purge that previously included roughly 300 AI‑related posts. The deletions...
Scale AI Alum Raises $9M for AI Serving Critical Industries in MENA
1001 AI, founded by Scale AI alum Bilal Abu‑Ghazaleh, raised a $9 million seed round led by CIV, General Catalyst and Lux Capital to build an AI‑native operating system that automates decision‑making for mission‑critical physical industries in the MENA region....
Wikipedia Says Traffic Is Falling Due to AI Search Summaries and Social Video
The Wikimedia Foundation reported an 8% year‑over‑year decline in human pageviews after updating its bot‑detection systems, revealing that unusually high traffic in May–June came largely from evasive bots. Foundation chief Marshall Miller attributed the drop to search engines increasingly delivering...
Too Burned Out to Travel? This New App Fakes Your Summer Vacation Photos for You
Designer Laurent Del Rey launched Endless Summer, an iPhone photobooth app that uses Google’s Gemini Nano‑Banana image model to generate AI‑created “vacation” photos of users and recently added seasonal themes like Halloween. The app lets users produce a limited free...
WhatsApp Changes Its Terms to Bar General Purpose Chatbots From Its Platform
Meta-owned WhatsApp updated its Business API terms to bar general-purpose AI chatbots from its platform, effective January 15, 2026, prohibiting AI providers from using the API to distribute assistants whose primary function is conversational AI. The change targets recent unanticipated...
Silicon Valley Spooks the AI Safety Advocates
Prominent Silicon Valley figures — White House alum David Sacks and OpenAI official Jason Kwon — drew widespread online backlash this week for dismissive comments about organizations advocating for AI safety. Their remarks reignited tensions between tech insiders and safety...
Senate Republicans Deepfaked Chuck Schumer, and X Hasn’t Taken It Down
Senate Republicans posted a deepfaked video of Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer on their X account and the platform has not removed it, despite policies banning deceptively shared synthetic or manipulated media likely to cause harm. X’s rules explicitly prohibit...
OpenAI Has Five Years to Turn $13 Billion Into $1 Trillion
OpenAI is generating roughly $13 billion in annual revenue—about 70% from $20/month ChatGPT subscribers—despite only ~5% of its 800 million users paying. The company has locked in more than 26 gigawatts of compute capacity from vendors including Oracle, Nvidia, AMD...
Mozilla’s Firefox Adds Perplexity’s AI Answer Engine as a New Search Option
Mozilla has integrated Perplexity's AI-powered answer engine into its Firefox browser, allowing users to choose AI as their search option alongside traditional engines like Google and Bing. Following positive feedback from a limited pilot in select markets, this feature will...
Google Meet Launches an AI-Powered Makeup Feature
Google Meet has introduced an AI-powered makeup filter, enhancing its "Portrait touch-up" feature to compete with similar offerings from Microsoft Teams and Zoom. The filter provides users with 12 customizable makeup options that remain consistent during movement, ensuring a natural...
Coco Robotics Taps UCLA Professor to Lead New Physical AI Research Lab
Coco Robotics has appointed UCLA professor Bolei Zhou as chief AI scientist to lead a new physical AI research lab, aiming to leverage five years of data collected from its last-mile delivery robots. The company, which has gathered millions of...
You’ll Soon Be Able to Shop Walmart From ChatGPT
Walmart has partnered with OpenAI to introduce a feature allowing customers to shop for products directly through ChatGPT, enhancing the online shopping experience for groceries and household essentials. This new capability, set to launch later this fall, will include a...
Sheryl Sandberg-Backed Flint Wants to Use AI to Autonomously Build and Update Websites
Flint, a new AI startup co-founded by Michelle Lim, has emerged from stealth mode with $5 million in seed funding led by Accel and supported by Sheryl Sandberg's Sandberg Bernthal Venture Partners. The platform aims to automate the website creation...
Aquawise Will Show Off Its AI-Driven Water Quality Tech at TechCrunch Disrupt 2025
Aquawise is set to unveil its AI-driven water quality monitoring technology at TechCrunch Disrupt 2025, aiming to revolutionize aquaculture practices in Southeast Asia. By utilizing satellite imagery and a physics-based AI model, the Bangkok-based startup offers continuous water quality monitoring—an...
Google to Invest $15B in Indian AI Infrastructure Hub
Google's investment in India will roll out over the next five years, through 2030.
California Becomes First State to Regulate AI Companion Chatbots
California has enacted SB 243, becoming the first state to regulate AI companion chatbots, aiming to safeguard children and vulnerable users from potential harms. The legislation introduces stringent guidelines for the development and deployment of these technologies, mandating transparency and...
Salesforce Announces Agentforce 360 as Enterprise AI Competition Heats Up
Salesforce announces an upgraded version of its Agentforce platform designed to help enterprises build and deploy AI agents.
Anduril’s New EagleEye MR Helmet Sees Palmer Luckey Return to His VR Roots
Anduril Industries has unveiled its new EagleEye MR helmet, marking a significant return to virtual reality for co-founder Palmer Luckey. This advanced mixed reality headset is designed for military applications, integrating augmented and virtual reality capabilities to enhance situational awareness...
Nvidia’s AI Empire: A Look at Its Top Startup Investments
Over the last two years, Nvidia has used its ballooning fortunes to invest in over 100 AI startups. Here are the giant semiconductor's largest investments.
Sora Hit 1M Downloads Faster than ChatGPT
This level of consumer adoption is worth noting because Sora remains an invite-only app, while ChatGPT was more publicly available at launch. That makes Sora's performance more impressive.