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AI Agenda

By Stephanie Palazzolo

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Recent Editions

Dave Orr, Anthropic's new head of safeguards.

Anthropic’s New Safety Lead; The Startup Making Nvidia’s Software Easier To Use

By Stephanie Palazzolo · Aug 12, 2025 7:00am PDT

We might be a long way away from sipping Pina Coladas on a beach while AI-powered humanoid robots handle all our work. But we’re already starting to see how AI is upending society. Some ChatGPT users are lamenting that they’ve lost their “only friend overnight” with the latest GPT-5 update, while other headlines suggest AI chatbots can even... We might be a long way away from sipping Pina Coladas on a beach while AI-powered humanoid robots...

OpenAI President Greg Brockman, and Cursor CEO Michael Truell demo GPT-5. Photo via YouTube/OpenAI.

GPT-5 Ushers In AI’s ‘Trough of Disillusionment’

By Stephanie Palazzolo · Aug 11, 2025 7:00am PDT · 1 comment

There’s no doubt: OpenAI’s GPT-5 is a good model.I’ve been talking to developers, who’ve had a chance to to use the AI now. As we predicted, the flagship AI improved in domains like coding—where it got better at both practical coding tasks and designing websites and apps—and creative writing. Developers told me that the new model is also better... There’s no doubt: OpenAI’s GPT-5 is a good model.I’ve been talking to developers, who’ve had a...

Art via Mike Sullivan

Chinese Models Lead the Pack on Video AI, for Now

By Rocket Drew · Aug 7, 2025 7:00am PDT

Before we get to today’s column, OpenAI is set to release its latest flagship model, GPT-5, later Thursday morning.We may have taken some of the wind out of the launch’s sails thanks to our reporting in recent weeks on how GPT-5 came together and what you can expect from the model (sorry OpenAI!), but there’s still lots to look forward to with... Before we get to today’s column, OpenAI is set to release its latest flagship model, GPT-5, later...

Photo via Getty

OpenAI’s Secret Strategy for Its Open Models

By Stephanie Palazzolo · Aug 6, 2025 7:00am PDT

Photo via Getty

OpenAI’s Secret Strategy for Its Open Models

By Stephanie Palazzolo · Aug 6, 2025 7:00am PDT

AI developers rejoice! After months of buildup, OpenAI yesterday finally released the first open-weight large language models it’s put out since 2019, which in AI land is forever. (ChatGPT itself was released less than three years ago.) The impetus for OpenAI to launch an open-weight model goes back to China’s DeepSeek, which exploded onto... AI developers rejoice! After months of buildup, OpenAI yesterday finally released the first...

Art via Mike Sullivan

AI Agenda: Andreessen Horowitz Backs Property Management and Healthcare Voice Agent Startup at $2 Billion Valuation

By Stephanie Palazzolo, Sri Muppidi and Cory Weinberg · Aug 5, 2025 7:00am PDT · 1 comment

Earlier this year, we wrote about investors’ growing interest in startups building AI-powered voice agents for various industries, from hospitality to construction.If you want a sign of just how interested investors are, look no further than EliseAI, which is building AI for the property management and healthcare industries, including voice... Earlier this year, we wrote about investors’ growing interest in startups building AI-powered...

Photo via Getty

Why ‘Universal Verifiers’ Are OpenAI’s Secret Weapon

By Stephanie Palazzolo and Rocket Drew · Aug 4, 2025 7:00am PDT

One reason why reinforcement learning—a technique for improving AI models—has become so popular is because researchers can quickly scale it up by using AI to automate writing lots of examples of questions and answers in tough domains like biology, software programming and medicine. RL works best when researchers can quickly verify whether... One reason why reinforcement learning—a technique for improving AI models—has become so popular...

Erik Bernhardsson, CEO of Modal. Screenshot via YouTube

Another AI Cloud Startup Becomes a Unicorn

By Stephanie Palazzolo and Sri Muppidi · Jul 31, 2025 7:30am PDT

Lately, investors have been eager to back cloud startups that provide application developers with access to Nvidia graphics processing units and help them to develop and run AI models quickly. The investor interest comes despite questions about the profit margins of these startups, otherwise known as cloud GPU resellers or inference providers.In... Lately, investors have been eager to back cloud startups that provide application developers with...

Art via Mike Sullivan

AI Agenda: The Startups Hoping to Unseat Scale AI

By Stephanie Palazzolo and Sri Muppidi · Jul 30, 2025 7:00am PDT

Art via Mike Sullivan

AI Agenda: The Startups Hoping to Unseat Scale AI

By Stephanie Palazzolo and Sri Muppidi · Jul 30, 2025 7:00am PDT

Before we get to today's column, my colleague Valida and I reported Tuesday that Canadian AI model maker Cohere is in talks to raise up to $500 million in a new funding round at a $6.3 billion valuation. Existing investors Inovia Capital and Radical Ventures are in talks to invest in the round. This company recently generated revenue at an... Before we get to today's column, my colleague Valida and I reported Tuesday that Canadian AI...

Runway CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela at The Information’s Private Capital Conference. Photo by Nicole Pereira.

Runway, Luma Target Sales to Robotics Companies

By Rocket Drew · Jul 29, 2025 7:00am PDT

Imax on Monday announced that it would screen the winning films from Runway’s AI-generated film festival at some of its theaters. Netflix recently said it had used AI to generate a scene in one of its shows for the first time: a building collapsing in The Eternaut, an Argentine sci-fi show. Both announcements show that video-generating AI... Imax on Monday announced that it would screen the winning films from Runway’s AI-generated film...

Tesla Bot Optimus hands a child a tub of popcorn last week in LA. Photo via Getty

Why Hands Are a Handful for Tesla's Humanoid Robots

By Rocket Drew · Jul 28, 2025 7:00am PDT · 2 comments

On Friday, we reported on Tesla’s Optimus humanoid robot program, which may fall well short of Elon Musk’s ambitious goal to pump out 5,000 robots by the end of the year. It turns out the robots’ hands are among the big factors holding up production. In fact, some Optimus robots that are mostly complete have been sitting unused at a Tesla... On Friday, we reported on Tesla’s Optimus humanoid robot program, which may fall well short of ...

Photo via Getty

OpenAI’s GPT-5 Shines in Coding Tasks

By · Jul 25, 2025 7:00am PDT

GPT-5 is almost here, and we’re hearing good things. The early reaction from at least one person who’s used the unreleased version was extremely positive.That’s good news for OpenAI. The ChatGPT creator has been under pressure to show major gains from its next big artificial intelligence model since we first broke the news last November that it... GPT-5 is almost here, and we’re hearing good things. The early reaction from at least one person...

Donald Trump. Photo by Getty

The Winners and Losers of Trump’s AI Plan

By Rocket Drew and Anissa Gardizy · Jul 24, 2025 6:40am PDT · 1 comment

Donald Trump. Photo by Getty

The Winners and Losers of Trump’s AI Plan

By Rocket Drew and Anissa Gardizy · Jul 24, 2025 6:40am PDT · 1 comment

President Donald Trump’s 23-page AI Action Plan, released on Wednesday, won’t transform the AI industry overnight, but it offers a sense of who stands to gain or lose under the current administration’s agenda. Big winners include those developing open-source models, such as Meta Platforms, while a requirement for plugging AI chip export... President Donald Trump’s 23-page AI Action Plan, released on Wednesday, won’t transform the AI...

Photo via Getty

The Enterprise Data War Hits OpenAI

By Stephanie Palazzolo · Jul 23, 2025 7:00am PDT

Slack is the glue that holds OpenAI together: Everyone at the 3,000-person company constantly uses the messaging app to discuss their work, former employees have said.So perhaps it’s no surprise that as OpenAI tried to turn ChatGPT into a core enterprise productivity app that connects to all the other apps people use for work, it wanted... Slack is the glue that holds OpenAI together: Everyone at the 3,000-person company constantly...

Art by Mike Sullivan

Where Reinforcement Learning is Going

By Stephanie Palazzolo · Jul 22, 2025 7:00am PDT · 1 comment

Ever since researchers began noticing a slowdown in improvements to large language models using traditional training methods, they’ve shifted to reinforcement learning, a technique that rewards a model for accomplishing certain goals and penalizes it for other behaviors, as we covered last week.That typically means human experts giving feedback... Ever since researchers began noticing a slowdown in improvements to large language models using...

Art via Mike Sullivan

Where LLMs Are Falling Short

By Stephanie Palazzolo · Jul 21, 2025 7:00am PDT · 5 comments

I’m back from the International Conference on Machine Learning in Vancouver, one of the biggest annual meetups for artificial intelligence researchers. And this year, the conference underscored all the ways in which large language models are still falling short of everyone’s expectations, despite the immense progress that got us to this point.... I’m back from the International Conference on Machine Learning in Vancouver, one of the biggest...

Art via Mike Sullivan

OpenAI’s Clever Coding Hack with ChatGPT ‘Startup-Killing’ Agents

By Stephanie Palazzolo · Jul 17, 2025 7:00am PDT · 1 comment

Art via Mike Sullivan

OpenAI’s Clever Coding Hack with ChatGPT ‘Startup-Killing’ Agents

By Stephanie Palazzolo · Jul 17, 2025 7:00am PDT · 1 comment

OpenAI is continuing its push into the application layer with ChatGPT “agents.” As we scooped this week, it plans new features that will allow users to create and edit spreadsheets and presentations, generate reports and automate tasks on their browsers—all through ChatGPT.There was one interesting detail in that news that you might have missed.... OpenAI is continuing its push into the application layer with ChatGPT “agents.” As we scooped...

Image via Getty

Why xAI Spent So Much on Reinforcement Learning

By Stephanie Palazzolo · Jul 16, 2025 7:00am PDT · 2 comments

Watching last week’s Grok 4 release, one statistic stood out to us. XAI said it spent 10 times as much computational power on reinforcement learning for Grok 4 as it laid out for Grok 3.RL is a common AI development technique that rewards a model for accomplishing certain goals and penalizes it for other behaviors. The xAI disclosure provided... Watching last week’s Grok 4 release, one statistic stood out to us. XAI said it spent 10 times as...

Mark Zuckerberg wearing Orion AR glasses. Photo by Getty

Zuckerberg Says His AI Will Solve ‘Simpler Things’ Than Its Rivals

By Stephanie Palazzolo · Jul 15, 2025 7:00am PDT · 1 comment

Before we get to today’s column about Cognition buying Windsurf, Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Monday spoke to Jessica Lessin, our editor in chief, for the inaugural episode of TITV, a new daily tech show, about the question on everyone’s mind these days: Why exactly would an AI researcher come to Meta? (Other than the $100 million pay... Before we get to today’s column about Cognition buying Windsurf, Meta Platforms CEO Mark...

Photos via Getty

Grok 4 is the Real Deal

By Rocket Drew and Amir Efrati · Jul 14, 2025 7:00am PDT

Before we get to today’s main column about Grok 4, we wanted to share four things we learned from the craziness on Friday, when Google snatched the CEO and technology behind Windsurf, a competitor to Cursor that OpenAI had agreed to buy for $3 billion just two months ago. Before we get to today’s main column about Grok 4, we wanted to share four things we learned from...

Art by Mike Sullivan

What the OpenAI Web Browser Means; Musk Says Grok 4 is No. 1

By Amir Efrati · Jul 10, 2025 7:00am PDT

Art by Mike Sullivan

What the OpenAI Web Browser Means; Musk Says Grok 4 is No. 1

By Amir Efrati · Jul 10, 2025 7:00am PDT

OpenAI’s embrace of Google Cloud servers isn’t stopping it from launching a direct assault on several of Google’s core products. Its next target: Chrome.Reuters on Wednesday reported that OpenAI’s web browser is coming soon. It’s been eight months since we broke the first news about OpenAI’s development of the browser, including its hiring of... OpenAI’s embrace of Google Cloud servers isn’t stopping it from launching a direct assault on...