Good morning, {{ first_name | AI enthusiasts }} and welcome to the 6,243 new readers who joined us yesterday. Black Forest Labs made its name in the AI image world. Its newest model, while able to create images, video, and audio, is now also reporting for work on an Audi production line.
FLUX 3, the company's 'visual intelligence' model, generates realistic video by simulating how the world actually moves — the same skill that is now helping train and steer machines in the physical world.
In today’s AI rundown:
FLUX 3 stretches from videos to factory robots
Rowan’s Corner: How we're building AI intuition at The Rundown
Edit videos faster with AI (for non-editors)
OpenAI, Anthropic launch dueling voice upgrades
4 new AI tools, community workflows, and more
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS
BLACK FOREST LABS
Image source: Black Forest Labs
The Rundown: Black Forest Labs just opened early access to FLUX 3, a ‘visual intelligence’ AI that generates video, images, and synced audio, with the German lab also spinning it into FLUX-mimic, a robot-control variant for Audi's production lines.
The details:
FLUX 3 produces 20-second clips with native audio, with capabilities including multilingual dialogue, typography, and style/character adherence.
The model can handle text, image, and video inputs, with BFL's testing showing its outputs favored over rivals like Runway, Kling, and Grok Imagine.
The full rollout will include video, image, and partner-specific action models, plus an open-weight FLUX 3 Dev sized to fit on factory hardware.
FLUX-mimic, built with Zurich-based mimic robotics, learns a new factory task from about a half-hour of demonstration data instead of the usual 30+ hours.
Why it matters: BFL has typically moved at a slower pace, but the unified system looks like the payoff – with longer, audio-synced videos and coherent visuals (like this hilarious one) reminding us of the Sora days (in a good way). For mimic, visual models continue to creep into the physical world, becoming one of the key cogs in robotics.
TOGETHER WITH AWS
The Rundown: AWS re:Invent is bringing 2,200+ sessions to Las Vegas on Nov. 30 through Dec. 4, and 70% of them are hands-on.
This year, choose to:
Work through real problems in 300+ workshops and 250+ builders' sessions
Debug alongside peers in 125+ code talks
Whiteboard your architecture in 350+ chalk talks with the engineers behind the services
ROWAN’S CORNER
Image source: The Rundown
Rowan: Last week, I broke down the most important skill of the AI age: AI intuition, knowing when to use AI and when not to. This week, I want to go deeper into how I'm actually applying it across the team at The Rundown.
The chart above is our role-by-role AI fluency standard, mapping what unacceptable, expected, and exceptional AI usage looks like. Even as an AI-first startup, a framework like this sets the standard with real examples.
Some more rules from our AI fluency memo:
AI is an amplifier, not a crutch. If your work gets worse because of AI, that's on you. "AI did it" is never an acceptable excuse. On the flip side, refusing to experiment means you won't keep up with high performers or AI agents.
Everyone spends 2 hours a week finding the tedious parts of their job and building workflows for them, then shares wins in our #ai-show-and-tell channel.
Everyone gets $200/month for AI tools. The only condition is that you have to name the problem you're trying to automate. Not to gatekeep spending, but to make sure every experiment starts with a real problem.
The goal behind all of it is reps. AI intuition works like business intuition: nobody is born with it. You build it by pushing tools to their limits until knowing when to reach for AI becomes instinct.
If your team hasn’t set a standard like this yet, I highly recommend it. Here’s a downloadable template of my setup you can clone.
AI TRAINING
The Rundown: In this guide, you will learn how to edit videos using AI, as we do at The Rundown, and then teach ChatGPT to edit for you hands-free.
Step-by-step:
Open Descript’s desktop app, record your camera and your desktop if you like
When you're done recording, duplicate the project before editing
On the duplicate, use the AI tools “Remove filler words” and “Shorten word gaps” to clean filler words and remove delays longer than one second. Turn on “avoid harsh cuts” so the edits sound natural
Run “Edit for Clarity” on Low and go through the AI suggestions
Pro tip: Connect the Descript plugin in ChatGPT or Codex, and teach it your editing process for hands-free editing.
PRESENTED BY STRANDS AGENTS
The Rundown: Your agent harness can have a bigger impact than the model you're running. With Strands Agents, you can build your own agent harness and control it end-to-end without getting locked in.
Run it with any model, any cloud, anywhere:
Monitor, modify, and debug with hooks
Deliver outcomes that work with guardrails that catch mistakes before they run
Replace brittle scripts with tools that adapt when processes change
Strands was built from prod systems inside Amazon. Start building with code examples.
OPENAI & ANTHROPIC
Image source: @OpenAI and @Claudeai on X
The Rundown: OpenAI and Anthropic shipped voice upgrades at nearly the exact same time, with OAI moving its GPT-Live voice into the desktop app and into Codex, and Anthropic plugging Claude's voice into its smarter models and connected apps.
The details:
OpenAI's ChatGPT Voice joins the desktop app on macOS and Windows for paid plans, letting users talk to agents in Codex and ChatGPT Work via speech.
A custom hotkey calls the voice mode over any app, with Bloomberg reporting that the same tech may drive OAI's upcoming home speaker hardware.
Claude's voice mode now runs on Opus and Sonnet rather than only its small Haiku model, while also being able to connect to apps like Gmail and Slack.
Claude lags behind with turn-by-turn speaking, with the recent launch of GPT-Live pushing a flow that listens, thinks, and replies at the same time.
Why it matters: Both labs shipped something useful, just not what many users were looking for after rumors of a Claude 5 Opus drop and Cerebras-powered speed upgrades for OAI. Even with the upgrade, Anthropic feels behind its biggest rival on voice, with speech continuing to grow as a primary way people work with AI.
QUICK HITS
🎥 FLUX 3 - BFL’s multimodal AI with 20-second generations
💬 Poke - Proactive personal agent that lives inside text messages
🏥 Health in ChatGPT - Link medical apps and records to chat about health
🗣️ GPT Live - OpenAI’s more natural voice model, now on Desktop and Codex
Cognition announced the acquisition of The Interaction Company, with its text-message-based AI agent Poke now being built alongside Cognition’s Devin agent.
U.S. AI chip startup Etched secured $300M in new funding just weeks after exiting stealth, with the company now valued at $10.3B and pushing its total funding past $1B.
Canadian mathematician Jacob Tsimerman is joining OpenAI to work on AI safety, with the news coming on the same day he was awarded the 2026 Fields Medal.
Microsoft's superintelligence team dropped two in-house models, with MAI-Image-2.5-Pro as its new image AI and MAI-Voice-2-Flash as a faster, cheaper voice engine.
Runway launched Media Router in its dev platform, which auto-picks an image, video, or audio model for each request based on user preference for cost, quality, or speed.
COMMUNITY
Every newsletter, we showcase how a reader is using AI to work smarter, save time, or make life easier.
Today’s workflow comes from reader James in Lancaster, PA:
“I found a professional DJ controller on Facebook Marketplace that was damaged by a water spill and did not power on. I copy/pasted the entire conversation with the seller into Claude, which produced a detailed risk assessment and guidance on price negotiation. I ended up purchasing the unit for only $800.
I uploaded the PDF service manuals to Claude, who guided me through the professional disassembly and diagnostic process. I was uploading photos of circuit boards, and Claude was describing the exact terminals where I should make voltage measurements. The faulty component turned out to be a $30 sensor strip inside the jog wheel. I replaced the part, reassembled the unit, and it powered on instantly!
Claude helped me obtain a $2,000 professional DJ controller for only $800, a $30 replacement part, and a few hours of DIY tech service.”
How do you use AI? Tell us here.
Read our last AI newsletter: OpenAI’s cyber test escapes the lab
Read our last Tech newsletter: China’s plan to knock an asteroid off course
Read our last Robotics newsletter: A $1.7B computer for the physical world
Today’s AI tool guide: Edit videos faster with AI (for non-editors)
RSVP to next workshop on July 30: ChatGPT Sites for beginners
That's it for today!
See you soon,
Rowan, Zach, Shubham, and Jennifer — the humans behind The Rundown
