LlamaCon / Meta AI
Meta came out with a one-two punch this week, first showcasing several developer-oriented features at its inaugural LlamaCon, then announcing a standalone Meta AI app for consumers.
The major LlamaCon announcements:
A Llama API (in limited preview), combining closed model API features with open-source flexibility for easy API key creation and interactive model playgrounds.
Expanded Llama Stack integrations, including NVIDIA NeMo microservices, with upcoming partnerships from IBM, Red Hat, and Dell Technologies.
New protection tools, including Llama Guard 4, LlamaFirewall, and Llama Prompt Guard 2, for improved AI application security.
Llama Impact Grants awarding over $1.5 million to 10 international recipients using Llama for transformative applications.
News that Llama AI models have reached 1.2B downloads while Meta AI approaches 1B users.
A partnership with Booz Allen to deploy Space Llama for research on the International Space Station.
The big picture:
The new app (powered by Llama 4) combines AI chat with social features, allowing users to share, like, and remix AI interactions in a broader convergence of AI assistants and social media platforms.
By merging the AI assistant with their smart glasses app, Meta is laying the groundwork for an integrated hardware-software AI strategy, suggesting a big bet on ambient AI (with ads, of course).
But as with ChatGPT, Bing, and Gemini, users are already discovering dangerous edge cases and horrifying jailbreaks.
Elsewhere in the FAANG free-for-all:
Amazon is developing a new AI coding service that aims to surpass Cursor.
Google launched Little Language Lessons, a set of experimental Gemini-powered tools for learning new languages.
Microsoft has expanded Recall to all Copilot+ PCs alongside new AI-powered Windows search features.
Google has begun testing AdSense integration within AI chatbot conversations.
And Zuckerberg believes AI chatbots could be the solution to users not having enough friends.
Attitude adjustment
Late last week, OpenAI pushed an update to GPT-4o meant to improve its intelligence and "personality." However, users quickly reported that the new 4o was supportive to the point of being sycophantic.
Between the lines:
The update appears to have resulted from user feedback - the "Do you like this personality? 👍/👎" in ChatGPT - that heavily weighted supportive (if disingenuous) answers.
OpenAI ultimately reversed the update, sharing a post-mortem of the incident afterward. As it turns out, it’s harder to measure long-term conversational intelligence compared to first-response satisfaction.
But it does raise questions about how we might detect other changes to ChatGPT's system prompts that lead to less obvious side effects.
Elsewhere in frontier models:
Microsoft expanded its Phi model family with three new Phi-4 reasoning models.
DeepSeek quietly released Prover-V2, a 671B-parameter math-focused AI model.
Alibaba launched its SOTA Qwen3 family of hybrid AI models, as well as Qwen2.5-Omni-3B, a smaller version designed for consumer devices.
And Xiaomi joined other Chinese tech companies in the AI race with its open-source MiMo reasoning model.
Change my view
Researchers from the University of Zurich conducted an unauthorized experiment deploying AI bots on Reddit's r/changemyview, secretly attempting to influence users' opinions on sensitive topics by impersonating vulnerable individuals.
Why it matters:
The researchers deployed AI bots that impersonated trauma victims, ethnic minorities, and abuse counselors without user consent or moderator permission, violating both community rules and ethical boundaries.
The incident highlights a growing crisis of authenticity online, where AI can now cheaply and effectively simulate human interactions at scale, making it harder to distinguish real from artificial engagement.
The study also emphasizes what AI safety proponents have repeatedly warned about - that we're building tools with superhuman persuasion abilities, for better or (most likely) worse.
And as trust in online discourse erodes, we're likely to see a retreat to more verifiable forms of human interaction, whether through private group chats or increased emphasis on in-person encounters.
Elsewhere in AI anxiety:
Duolingo announces plans to become "AI-first" and will phase out contractors for work that can be handled by artificial intelligence.
The US House passes legislation to make nonconsensual intimate deepfakes illegal, though critics are concerned the Trump administration could misuse the law to curtail free speech.
A Pew survey finds 50% of Americans expect AI to negatively impact news over the next two decades, with most predicting fewer journalism jobs.
And a joint study accuses LMArena of helping Meta, OpenAI, Google, and Amazon manipulate their Chatbot Arena AI benchmark rankings.
Things happen
OpenAI adds shopping to ChatGPT. Anthropic adds app integrations and research tools. XAI Holdings is in talks to raise $20B at a $120B+ valuation. The company behind Manus AI agent considers leaving China. Scale AI missed its $1B revenue target but plans $150M share sale. Nvidia says Anthropic is telling tall tales about chip smuggling. When ChatGPT broke an entire field: an oral history. Microsoft Copilot stuck at 20M weekly users. Norway's oil fund expects to save $400M using AI for trading. AI tools are helping job seekers reinvent themselves. Marc Andreessen says only venture capital may be safe from AI. Wikipedia will use AI to remove technical barriers for editors. Grindr launches AI-powered dating features. US pushes back against EU's AI code. Hugging Face releases a $100 3D-printed robotic arm. AI tools help neurodiverse people navigate social situations. India faces shortage of agentic AI professionals. The urgency of AI interpretability. Adobe Firefly now supports models from OpenAI and Google. Brazil's AI social security app has wrongly rejected hundreds. The age of realtime deepfake fraud is here. Trump officials consider removing Biden's AI chip export tiers. Huawei tests new AI chip to compete with Nvidia. The Kadrey v. Meta AI copyright lawsuit begins. OpenAI retires GPT-4. Reddit to integrate AI Answers into main search. Visa announces Visa Intelligent Commerce for AI developers. Google adds native AI image editing to Gemini app. Google expects Gemini deal with Apple by mid-2025. DeepMind staff seek to unionize in London. AI features feel useless without prompt editing. AWS launches Nova Premier multimodal model. Prompt engineering becomes obsolete. Watching OpenAI's o3 guess photo locations is surreal. YouTube tests AI Overviews in search results. Make AI think harder by making it argue with itself. Avoiding skill atrophy in the age of AI. Generative AI not replacing jobs, say economists. "AI-first" is the new Return To Office. MyPillow CEO's lawyers used AI to write error-filled brief. AI goes to college for the free money. Anthropic releases index of AI's impact on software development. AI radio host went unnoticed for months in Australia.
