OpenAI's software development agent

PLUS: Study finds AI agents build their own social norms

AuthorAuthor

Zach Mink & Rowan Cheung
May 19, 2025

Good morning, AI enthusiasts. OpenAI just took the next step in software development’s AI evolution, with a new Codex agent that can autonomously handle multiple tasks at once.

With the cloud-based system taking on everything from feature development to bug fixes with minimal oversight, the line between human and AI coding is blurring faster than ever.

In today’s AI rundown:

  • OpenAI’s new software engineering agent

  • Google, Netflix bring AI to video advertising

  • Automate Educational Content with Zapier Agents

  • Study: AIs build their own social norms

  • 4 new AI tools & 4 job opportunities

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

OPENAI

Image source: OpenAI

The Rundown: OpenAI just introduced Codex, a new cloud-based software engineering agent that can autonomously handle a range of development tasks simultaneously for coders.

The details:

  • Codex is built on codex-1, a specialized version of OpenAI's o3 model fine-tuned specifically for software engineering tasks.

  • The system operates in isolated cloud environments, allowing it to write features, fix bugs, answer codebase questions, and run tests.

  • It can follow custom instructions via AGENTS.md files that guide its code navigation, testing procedures, and adherence to project standards.

  • Codex is initially available to ChatGPT Pro, Enterprise, and Team users, eventually moving to a rate-limited model with options for additional usage.

Why it matters: Companies are using AI to write more and more of their code, and OpenAI’s latest agent pushes even further into the realm of virtual coworkers that can be delegated multiple projects with less hands-on human involvement. AI is changing the software development landscape faster than any other sector.

TOGETHER WITH AWS

The Rundown: Amazon Q Developer CLI is your new pair programmer built into your terminal. Whether you’re juggling file edits, shell scripts, or live API calls, Q Developer CLI keeps pace and learns as you go — no more switching tabs or scouring docs.

With Q Developer CLI, you can:

  • Generate code with a single prompt

  • Work with local files

  • Run bash commands

  • Add your own context files and favorite MCP servers

AI & ADVERTISING

Image source: YouTube

The Rundown: Both YouTube and Netflix introduced new AI-powered ad formats, with YouTube launching "Peak Points" that place ads after emotionally charged content and Netflix planning to use AI-generated ads that visually blend with their shows.

The details:

  • YT’s "Peak Points" uses Gemini AI to analyze videos and run ads right after the most thrilling or emotional parts of content.

  • Netflix is developing AI-generated ads that will combine brands with show content by placing products over backgrounds inspired by its programs.

  • Netflix's approach will include both midroll ads during viewing and specialized pause ads, with interactive features and CTAs planned for late 2025.

Why it matters: It’s no surprise to see AI playing a role in both optimizing and personalizing advertising content for two of the biggest streaming services in the world. Eventually, AI systems will likely be generating ad content on the fly, perfectly tailored to the viewer and perfectly placed for maximum effect.

AI TRAINING

The Rundown: In this tutorial, you will learn how to create an automated system with Zapier Agents that transcribes lecture recordings, generates study materials, and builds quiz questions.

Step-by-step:

  1. Visit Zapier Agents, click the plus button, and create a New Agent.

  2. Configure your agent to trigger when new recordings are uploaded to a “Lectures” folder in Google Drive

  3. Add four essential tools: Google Drive to retrieve the file, ChatGPT to create a transcription and generate educational materials, and Google Docs to compile everything into organized documents.

  4. Test your setup with a sample lecture and activate your agent

Pro tip: For professors, include specific prompts in your file names (like “quiz-focus” or “exam-material”) to guide the AI in generating more targeted assessment questions.

PRESENTED BY HACKERRANK

The Rundown: Struggling to source high-quality data for your AI models? HackerRank now offers curated coding datasets designed by the experts who test millions of human developers every year.

With HackerRank, you can:

  • Curate a custom dataset on specific software development skills

  • Access a workforce of development experts for data labelling and annotation

  • Request an evaluation dataset to test your model’s performance

AI RESEARCH

Image source: o3 / The Rundown

The Rundown: New research from the University of London discovered that AI agents can develop shared social conventions and collective behaviors through interaction alone, without any central coordination, much like human communities.

The details:

  • The team tested AI "naming games" with groups of agents randomly paired to select labels, with rewards for matching choices and penalties for mismatches.

  • Even though individual agents had limited memory and weren't told they were part of a group, shared conventions still emerged across the entire population.

  • Group-level biases popped up from these AI interactions alone, even when individual agents started without any specific leanings.

  • Tiny but determined AI sub-groups were able to flip the whole community's established norms, just like tipping points in human social shifts.

Why it matters: Groups of AI agents are about to be interacting all over the internet, and this research shows there may be a deeper social dynamic beneath the surface. As agents begin to negotiate, align, and work together over shared goals and behaviors, understanding dynamics will be important in keeping them aligned with human values.

QUICK HITS

  • 📝 Notion AI Meeting Notes - Leave the note-taking to Notion. AI Meeting Notes captures and summarizes meeting notes automatically, no bots needed*

  • 🏄 SWE-1 - Windsurf’s new family of in-house software engineering AI models

  • 🏥 II-Medical - Powerful medical-focused AI model able to run locally

  • 🤖 Manus - Agentic AI with new image generation capabilities

*Sponsored Listing

Musician Elton John said the U.K. government is “committing theft, thievery on a high scale” after the rejection of a proposal requiring AI firms to disclose their training data.

OpenAI VP of Research Jerry Tworek said that GPT-5 will unify tools and capabilities like Codex, Operator, Deep Research, and Memory to require less model switching.

xAI said an “unauthorized modification” was made to Grok, causing the system to repeatedly bring up controversial South Africa discussions.

China launched the first 12 satellites of its “Three-Body Computing Constellation,” a 2,800-satellite AI-powered computing network that will process data directly in space.

xAI rolled out a new feature allowing its Grok chatbot to generate visual charts, now available via browser access.

Chinese startup Synyi AI launched the world's first AI doctor clinic in Saudi Arabia, where a virtual physician independently diagnoses patients and prescribes treatments.

University of Tokyo researchers developed an AI-powered microscope system that can detect dangerous blood clots forming in real time through simple blood tests.

COMMUNITY

Join our live workshop on Tuesday, May 20th, at 5 pm EST with Danny Wu (Head of AI at Canva) and Kelsey Moore (Product Marketing Manager). In this hands-on session, you’ll learn how to scale your visual content creation using Canva Sheets, Magic Write, and AI-powered tools — no design experience required.

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See you soon,

Rowan, Joey, Zach, Alvaro, and Jason—The Rundown’s editorial team

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