Welcome back to Week in Review. This week, we’re looking at OpenAI’s reported plans for its next AI model; a buzzy new messaging app that’s a hit with Gen Z; and Tim Cook discovering that you can name a group chat in iMessage. Let’s get into it.
The Verge noted this week that OpenAI is reportedly planning to release its next frontier AI model, code-named Orion, by December. An OpenAI spokesperson denied the claim to TechCrunch, saying, “We don’t have plans to release a model code-named Orion this year.” But what that means is anybody’s guess and leaves OpenAI substantial wiggle room.
Character.AI is being targeted in a lawsuit after the suicide of a 14-year-old boy whose mother says he became obsessed with a chatbot on the platform. The company said it is rolling out new safety features, including “improved detection, response, and intervention” related to chats that violate its terms of service and a notification when a user has spent an hour in a chat.
More than 100 million individuals had their private health information stolen during the February ransomware attack on Change Healthcare. It’s the first time that UnitedHealth Group, the health insurance provider that owns the company, has put a number on the amount of individuals affected by the data breach; previously the company said it anticipated the breach included data on a “substantial proportion of people in America.”
This is TechCrunch’s Week in Review, where we recap the week’s biggest news. Want this delivered as a newsletter to your inbox every Saturday? Sign up here.
News
Mira Murati’s next move: Former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati is reportedly raising more than $100 million for a new AI startup, which will reportedly focus on building AI products based on proprietary models. Read more
What’s in a (group chat) name? A recent profile of Tim Cook revealed that he didn’t know you could name your group chats in iMessage. Cook has since named a group chat with his former college roommates as simply “Roommates.” Read more
Elon Musk’s chats with Putin: Elon Musk has reportedly been in regular contact with Russian president Vladimir Putin since late 2022. The Wall Street Journal reports that the conversations have raised national security concerns among some intelligence officials. Read more
Let Anthropic control your PC: Anthropic released an upgraded version of Claude 3.5 Sonnet that can understand and interact with any desktop app. The model can imitate keystrokes, button clicks, and mouse gestures, essentially emulating a person sitting at a computer. Read more
Smart glasses success: The Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses are proving to be a larger success than Meta originally expected. The glasses are the top selling product in 60% of all Ray-Ban stores throughout Europe, the Middle East, and Africa — even before its AI features roll out. Read more
Artificial (gut) intelligence: Throne is an Austin-based health startup selling a camera that clips onto the side of a toilet bowl and takes pictures of your poop. Currently in beta, the system utilizes AI to examine your stool and determine things like gut health and hydration. Read more
Turn your phone into an e-reader: Bookcase, the latest bit of tech novelty from Astropad, is a case with a MagSafe mount and an NFC chip that lets you hold a smartphone like a Kindle for a more comfortable mobile e-reading experience. Read more
Midjourney comes for the web: Midjourney is releasing an upgraded tool that lets users edit any uploaded images from the web using its generative AI. The upgraded tool will also allow users to retexture objects in images to “repaint” their colors and details according to captions. Read more
A cheaper way to get gas: Amazon is offering Prime members a 10 cents per gallon discount at around 7,000 Amoco, AM/PM, and BP gas stations across the U.S. to combat high gas prices — and challenge rival service Walmart+. Read more
A message app for the next generation: Daze is a creative, AI-powered messaging app that is blowing up among Gen Z users, with a waitlist of roughly 156,000 signups before its launch on November 4. Read more
A closer look at Apple’s hearing aid feature: TechCrunch’s Brian Heater got to test out Apple’s upcoming accessibility features for the AirPods Pro 2 that allow the earbuds to act as a hearing aid and provide hearing tests. Read more
Analysis
23andMe and you: 23andMe is facing an uncertain future amid efforts to take the company private, intensifying concerns about what might happen to the genetic data of the company’s some 15 million customers. If you’ve shipped your saliva to 23andMe, you may have assumed that this data will remain private under law. But as Carly Page writes, 23andMe is not covered under HIPAA and is largely bound only by its own privacy policies, which it can change at any time. But there is an easy way to request the deletion of your data. Read more