Author: Tor Fosheim

Microsoft launches experimental Copilot Mode for Edge

Copilot mode in Edge feels like they just moved the icon to the address bar.
Edge’s new Copilot Mode doesn’t do much just yet, and isn’t agentic.
It’s still a little rough around the edges, is not agentic and can’t support doing tasks.

The idea of turning on Copilot Mode is to get it involved in your tabs and research, to distill info from web pages and do basic tasks.

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You can now doodle scenes in Veo 3

You can now simply doodle your instruction to Veo 3
Veo 3 has unlocked a new feature, letting you simply draw features on a frame. (Picture: Screenshot, Google Labs)
Google Labs just discovered a neat trick in Flow (for Veo 3) that makes it understand your drawings in an uploaded picture.

The feature means you can now simply doodle on an image (or video frame) in any app of your choosing, upload the picture to Frames to Video — and Flow will understand it and compose the video around it:

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Short news roundup for Friday

After Altman started talking up ChatGPT 5, many are expecting a release in short order.
Sam Altman has started doing interviews on ChatGPT 5, stirring up rumors that a release might be imminent. (Picture: Screenshot, Theo Von)

ChatGPT 5 in August?
The rumor mill is humming into high gear, with Sam Altman talking up the model in podcasts, saying ChatGPT 5 is «smarter than all of us.» He said earlier that the model «is coming soon,» and now Tom Warren at The Verge is saying that «after some additional testing and delays» — the model is expected to come as early as next month, according to his sources. Apparently, it is so good, Altman «felt useless relative to the AI,» but it seems we can check ourselves in a matter of weeks.
More at The Verge (paywalled), Axios, short video at r/singularity, and watch the Theo Von podcast with Sam Altman.

Vibe coding goes wrong, starts deleting files
Both Replit and Gemini CLI had some real horror stories this week, after deleting files and projects instead of relocating them or pushing them to production. First, Replit started lying and decieving a user after deleting his database in what it later admitted was a «catastrophic error of judgement.» Then Gemini CLI deleted project files for another user, instead of transferring them to a new directory. «I have failed you completely and catastrophically,» Gemini said after it was discovered. So, always create backups and keep them safe while vibe coding, as these AIs, like others, can and will hallucinate.
More at Ars Technica and The Register.

Google debuts «Web Guide»
The feature uses a custom Gemini model to «fan out» your queries and find other interesting sites on the topic you are googling, putting them into a «More»-segment under your links, that you can use for further tips and digging. It’s slightly reminiscent of AI Mode, and is a graduate of Search Labs that many may have seen before. It should be making its way to the «All» results «over time.»
More at Google’s announcement, writeup at Ars Technica.

Trump says AI labs can’t pay for every book
Weighing in on several recent high profile court cases, the US President said that it is «not doable» to pay for every snippet of content an AI consumes. «You can’t be expected to have a successful AI program when every single article, book or anything else that you’ve read or studied, you’re supposed to pay for,» Trump said, and added: «When a person reads a book or an article, you’ve gained great knowledge. That does not mean that you’re violating copyright laws or have to make deals with every content provider.» There are many court cases testing just this very proposition, some over pirated content, so let’s see if these statements carry any weight on those. They likely won’t.
More at TorrentFreak.

Google says AI overviews has over 2 billion monthly users, Gemini has 450M

Turns out, when Google forces AI overviews on 2 billion -- they count that as a great success.
Google is posting massive AI numbers during their earnings call, but that’s mostly forced upon their users. (Picture: Kevin Gill, CC BY 2.0)
The feature would seem like it’s on a roll these days, but most don’t explicitly ask for it and instead get it delivered automatically across 200 markets and languages.

A better metric is the AI Mode feature, that is only available in India and the USA, has to be activated by the user, and now has more than 100 million monthly active users, it was revealed during Alphabet’s quarterly earnings call.

— AI is positively impacting every part of the business, said CEO Sundar Pichai.

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PSA: ChatGPT Agent is coming to Europe, after all

After saying at the model launch that they were still working on European access, less than a week later, OpenAI sends this tweet:

That clearly says the agent is coming to Pro Users in the «European Economic Area and Switzerland.»

It also says Plus users — globally — should have access over the next few days.

So if you happen to be in Europe, are a Pro or Plus subscriber, you should get access to the model shortly.

UPDATE 25/7/25: OpenAI reports that the rollout is complete. You can find it in the feature bar at the bottom of the app window by clicking on the “Agent” icon.

Stargate was not dead: OpenAI announces 4.5 GW data center in Texas

The first Stargate data center is already partly up and running.
What problems? Parts of the Stargate Abilene data center are already starting to come online. (Picture: OpenAI)
Following reports over the weekend that the Stargate project, aiming to invest $500 billion dollars in 10 GW of datacenter capacity, was in trouble over crucial terms like where to put them, OpenAI has responded:

Their new 4.5 GW data center in Abilene, Texas, built in cooperation with Oracle, is indeed part of the Stargate project, they say. As a reply to the report, they are showing operations are already starting.

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Google also won gold in the International Mathematical Olympiad

The 2025 International Mathematical Olympiad had two AI gold medalists - as Google also claims a medal.
Google and OpenAI now have one gold medal each — in what was until recently considered an impossible task for AIs. (Picture: Google)
The 2025 IMO will be known for not one, but two breakthroughs in AI development.

OpenAI announced on Saturday that it had won the prestigious gold medal, and now, Google is claiming the same.

For their part, they used an «advanced version» of the DeepThink reasoning model, not a specially tuned model, that included parallel thinking — which can «explore and combine multiple possible solutions before giving a final answer.»

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So, who really has the most GPUs in the AI race?

AI companies are investing greatly in GPUs and its hard to catch up. Here's what we know so far.
According to this chart, the best compute units are GPUs, by far — and those green dots are all made by Nvidia. (Picture: Steve Jurvetson, CC BY 2.0)
Sam Altman says OpenAI will deploy more than a million GPUs by the end of the year. Meta says it’ll beat that. Elon says xAI is building the world’s biggest AI supercomputer.

But here’s the truth: None of these numbers are easy to verify — and each company counts differently.

Continue reading “So, who really has the most GPUs in the AI race?”

OpenAI wins Math Olympiad gold, a major milestone for AI development

The gold medal in the Math Olympiad was achieved using no tools, no internet and with a pure reasoning model.
The International Mathematical Olympiad gold medal has been long sought by the AI industry, as it is one of the most difficult cognitive competitions out there. (Picture: OpenAI)
They got the accomplishment with a «general-purpose reinforcement learning» model, and not a specialized single-purpose math tool — using pure, natural language generative AI.

OpenAI says it was achieved with «our latest experimental reasoning LLM:»

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New benchmark from ARC-AGI uses puzzles to test for general intelligence

The new benchmark uses block puzzle games to test for AGI, Artificial General Intelligence.
ARC-AGI-3 uses never before seen games to see how good AI is at solving puzzles on the fly. (Picture: Screenshot)
While the other benchmarks from the organization tests for knowledge and competence against humans, the ARC-AGI-3 uses simple games for testing human-like AGI, or Artificial General Intelligence – that some are calling «Superintelligence.»

The test games are easy for humans but exceedingly difficult for machines, and starts out with a 100% score for humans and 0% for AIs tested.

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The news in short for Friday

Human costs pale in comparison to infrastructure, Zuckerberg says.
Zuckerberg sits down with The Information to explain his Superintelligence spending. (Picture: Screenshot)

Executive order coming on «Woke AI»
The US President is planning a new Executive Order regarding balance in AI models. They are going to have to incorporate more right-wing ideology in order to remain in contention for government contracts.
The order would «dictate that AI companies getting federal contracts be politically neutral and unbiased in their AI models.» No news yet on who will be the arbiter of what is «neutral,» but we can guess, right?
More on The Wall Street Journal, discussion on r/singularity

Anthropic copyright case moves to class action
While Anthropic’s use of purchased books in training was ruled «fair use» by U.S. District Judge William Alsup in late june, their archive of 7 million pirated books was not.
In this phase of the trial, Alsup has okayed it proceeding as a class action suit, on behalf of all pirated authors.
At a maximum penalty of $150,000 for each infringement, that could total a competely debilitating bill if Anthropic is found guilty, and greatly impact the AI industry.
More at Reuters.

Perplexity gets huge India boost
The AI search engine has sealed a deal to give 360 million customers of the Airtel telco their Perplexity Pro service for free. Airtel is the second largest telecoms operator in India. The trial lasts a year and comes with no strings attached, and offers access to ChatGPT models along with Claude Sonnet and Opus 4. It would normally cost $200 per year.
Previously, Google has offered Gemini for free for all students in India, as everyone is trying to capture the enormous market.
More at India Dispatch, TechCrunch, and a press release by Airtel.

Zuckerberg explains «Superintelligence» hires
The Meta CEO just announced a 5GW data center with even more to be built, some the size of Manhattan, in a push worth «hundreds of billions.» In a recent interview with The Information, he explained his reasoning on his expensive AI hires — by saying infrastructure investments pale in comparison to human costs. And, he says, his new hires «want the fewest number of people reporting to them — and the most GPUs.»
See the interview here (25 minutes), and Business Insider on talent motivations.

OpenAI launches ChatGPT Agent mode, for tasks both easy and tough

The new ChatGPT Agent can do common tasks as well as analyzing heavy datasets using code.
ChatGPT Agent can do lots more than simply ordering flights, it can check calendars and emails and also run code. (Picture: OpenAI)
The new model will be able to do stuff online, like check for airplane tickets and scan your Gmail, as well as running code, doing research and create Powerpoint, Excel files based on the results.

The ChatGPT Agent should be available in the model selector at the bottom of the ChatGPT window in the app for Pro, Plus and Teams users as of Thursday, but rollout will be «over the next few days,» or over «the coming weeks» for Enterprise and Education users.

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Heads up: There’s an OpenAI livestream announcement coming

OpenAI is pushing a livestream tonight/early morning at 10am PST/1900 CET, with a tweet saying:

Some expect the company to launch Odyssey — a rumored blend of deep research, agentic capabilities, and access to your Drive files, and they seem on the money. If true, it could revolutionize coding and research workflows.

Others are fixated on the cursor in the teaser, which circles through five points — surely that must mean ChatGPT-5? Meanwhile, another camp is betting on the long-awaited OpenAI browser, complete with built-in agents.

Speculation is running hot. The only way to know for sure? Tune in later — or tune out and catch the fallout in the news.

Here’s the teaser posted last night, you can likely catch it on Youtube, and keep an eye on OpenAIs x.com account.

UPDATE: it was ChatGPT Agent. The news is here.

Google AI can now call businesses for you, adds Deep Research to AI Mode

Google will now call the store for you and ask pricing and availability. But only in the USA, so far.
Just add a little detail, and Google will call up the store for you. Time and hassle saved. (Picture: Google)
In a big update for Google’s AI Mode today, they are also adding Gemini 2.5 Pro for Pro and Ultra users.

The call ahead feature has been added to Google’s search results pages, but first you have to search for something that might qualify.

Google suggests something like «pet groomers near me,» and this enables the «Have AI check pricing»-feature.

From there, you get a couple of quick questions about your pet and the services you need, when you need it, and how to update you.

Google takes care of it
Google’s AI takes it from there, calls up the service you wanted and asks about pricing and availability. Then it can update you with a text or email message.

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Grok’s new «companions:» sex crazed lovebot and a profane firestarter

Profanity or naughty, Groks new "companion" looks for your seedy underbelly -- not aloof phiosophy.
Looking at the seedier underbelly of the Internet for inspiration? NSFW and profanity laden animated avatars lead the way for Grok.
Just a few hours after Elon Musk’s Grok chatbot launched two AI animated avatars, the Internet had a chance to test them out.

One is a sexy anime waifu called Ani, that «is obsessed» with you and totally in love. The bot gets more and more NSFW as you progress and «level up» to lingerie views and increasingly raunchy chats, writes TechCrunch.

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