GPT-5 felt “dumb”?

What we’ll cover today:

🚦 GPT-5 launch glitch

📷 Microsoft Lens shutdown

🛒 Pinterest on AI shopping

💸 OpenAI sparks price war

♟️GROK WATCH — The Chess Showdown

OpenAI’s o3 model beat Elon Musk’s Grok 4 in the final of a Kaggle-hosted AI chess tournament featuring eight large language models. [Read Full Story]

• Not chess engines: These were general-purpose AIs, tested for strategy and reasoning through chess.

• Grok’s rise and fall: Grok 4 dominated early rounds but faltered in the final, repeatedly losing its queen and making critical errors.

• Expert view: Chess.com’s Pedro Pinhata called Grok’s play “unrecognizable,” while GM Hikaru Nakamura said OpenAI punished every mistake.

• Final standings: Google’s Gemini finished third after beating another OpenAI model.

GPT-5’s Rough First Day 🚦

• OpenAI’s new auto-router for GPT-5 malfunctioned at launch, making the model feel weaker than GPT-4o for many users.

• Sam Altman says the issue has been fixed and Plus subscribers may regain access to 4o. [Read Full Story]

• Rate limits for Plus will double to encourage experimentation with GPT-5.

• The rollout was overshadowed by a misleading “chart crime” during the live presentation.

• The launch shows how technical issues and presentation missteps can undercut product momentum.

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Microsoft Kills Lens for Copilot 📷

• Microsoft will retire its Lens document scanning app starting September 15. [Read Full Story]

• Users are being moved to the Copilot app, which lacks key Lens features like OneNote/Word saves and accessibility tools.

• Lens was valued for its simplicity and reliability, with over 92 million downloads since 2017.

• The shift reflects Microsoft’s AI-first strategy, but comes at the cost of a proven, focused utility.

Pinterest on Agentic Shopping 🛒

• Pinterest’s CEO says AI autonomously shopping for users is still far in the future. [Read Full Story]

• The company is positioning itself as an AI-enabled shopping assistant instead.

• Earnings call avoided addressing issues with low-quality AI-generated content and moderation.

• Revenue exceeded expectations but EPS missed, leading to a stock drop.

• Gen Z now makes up more than half of monthly users, with male users up 95% year-over-year.

OpenAI’s Price War Play 💸

• GPT-5’s API pricing undercuts Anthropic and even OpenAI’s GPT-4o.

• Inputs cost $1.25/M tokens and outputs $10/M, far below Anthropic’s $15/$75 rates.

• Developers call the pricing “aggressively competitive” and see it as a potential trigger for an LLM price war. [Read Full Story]

• Industry infrastructure costs remain enormous, raising doubts about long-term sustainability.

• The move is a short-term win for startups reliant on model APIs, but may not last in a capex-heavy market.

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💡 5 (Real) AI Agent Business Ideas For 2025 – ideas for this year. →
🏥 AI is Transforming Healthcare – How AI is reshaping healthcare. →
🧠 I Tried 3 AI Idea Organizers for Notes – Tested top AI note tools side-by-side. →
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