Meta AI App, The New ChatGPT Competitor | Weekly Edition

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May 02, 2025

Hello and welcome to our weekly roundup!

Another big week: Meta launched its standalone AI app, OpenAI admitted mistakes, and Microsoft's head got candid about generated code. Plus some more interesting releases and even a scandal involving Reddit, AI, and scientists from Switzerland!

Let's discuss.

Earlier this week, I shared my AI stack, which I can't live without. Take a look if you missed it, I tried to make it as valuable and informative as possible:
AI Tools I Can’t Live Without
Stepan Ikaev
·
Apr 29
Read full story

This Creators’ AI Edition:

Featured Materials 🎟️
News of the week 🌍
Useful tools ⚒️
Weekly Guides 📕
AI Meme of the Week 🤡
AI Tweet of the Week 🐦
(Bonus) Materials 🎁

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Featured Material 🎟️

ChatGPT-Like App by Meta

So, Meta AI App. The company released its standalone platform as its first complete alternative to ChatGPT, powered by the new Llama 4 model, as part of the LlamaCon event. The free mobile and web versions let anyone with a Facebook or Instagram login start text or voice chats.

Positioning itself as “more personal,” Meta says the assistant can remember user‑approved facts, draw on profile data, and keep long‑running context, something the company hopes will differentiate it from OpenAI, Google, Anthropic, and others.

Functionally, everything is also familiar: you can chat with AI by voice or text, generate images, and share questions or content from your chats.

However, the app’s headline features focus on natural conversation and cross‑device continuity. Meta AI is designed to be ubiquitous across a vast ecosystem.

Meta Introduces Its AI Assistant App, which Includes Voice Conversation and Discover Feed | IBL News

A full‑duplex voice demo (live in the US, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand) generates speech directly rather than reading text, aiming for smooth back‑and‑forth dialogue. Conversations sync with Meta AI and with Ray‑Ban Meta smart glasses, so a chat started while walking can continue on a screen without losing context.

It also personalizes responses using your public Instagram and Facebook info (and remembers user-specified preferences, e.g., “I’m lactose intolerant”), while promising to keep your private chats encrypted. The app works as the same AI through Meta's website and other services, including WhatsApp, Instagram, and Facebook.

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An additional difference from ChatGPT and Gemini is the Discover section. This is a feed where you can view content that your Facebook and Instagram friends have generated and shared. According to the company, the idea is to “demystify AI.”

Simply put, AI should be made a more familiar part of society.

While core usage is free, Meta is already laying the groundwork for revenue: Mark Zuckerberg told investors that ads and an optional subscription tier, promising faster replies or extra features, will arrive after the company pushes adoption for at least a year .

About LlamaCon 2025

Of course, this week is important not only because of the release of the Meta AI app, but also the event at which it was presented. The company held its first LlamaCon.

LlamaCon is a conference centered on AI, specifically its Llama series of LLMs. Held at Meta's headquarters in Menlo Park, California, the event aimed to showcase advancements in open-source AI and foster collaboration among developers.

Besides the app, key announcements included: the release of Llama 4 models and the introduction of a new Llama API designed to simplify AI integration for developers. The conference also featured discussions on Meta's AI strategy, emphasizing its commitment to becoming a central hub for AI development.

And I especially suggest to check the conversation between Zuckerberg and Nadella.

News Of The Week 🌍

Anthropic Debuts Integrations to Hook Claude into Your Work Apps

Anthropic rolled out “Integrations,” a beta feature that connects Claude directly to 10 popular services— including Zapier, Jira, and Confluence—through its open MCP. With this feature, the assistant can pull data, draft briefs, and trigger multi‑step workflows from a single chat. It is now available for Max, Team, and Enterprise users and coming soon to the Pro tier.

The launch arrives alongside an upgraded Advanced Research mode that lets Claude run up to 45‑minute investigations across the web, Google Workspace, and any linked tools.

OpenAI Rolls Back GPT-4o Update Due to Annoying AI Behavior

OpenAI has rolled back last week’s GPT‑4o upgrade in ChatGPT after users (and Sam Altman) said the tweak made the bot excessively flattering and agreeable. The company restored an earlier GPT‑4o build for all free users and is completing the rollback for Plus, Team, and Enterprise tiers this week. In a post titled “Sycophancy in GPT‑4o,” OpenAI blamed short‑term reinforcement‑learning signals for the shift and said future releases may let people choose between different response styles.

This is a new level for OpenAI. We now enjoy not only the release of updates but also their rollback! But if you're still annoyed by ChatGPT, we know how to make it a cold-blooded robot:
AI Tools I Can’t Live Without
Stepan Ikaev
·
Apr 29
Read full story

Google Opens AI  Mode to U.S. Searchers in Public Test

An important Google feature will soon be available to the search engine user. In a blog post, the company announced that it is beginning a gradual rollout of AI Mode in the U.S. outside of the Google Labs platform. AI Mode allows you to receive generated cards with follow-up interactions in response to search queries. According to the developer, it can be used to plan trips, shop, or simply search for information.

At first glance, it may seem that AI Mode is analogous to AI Overview. That's not quite the case. AI Overview provides quick summaries, while AI Mode promises a more native search experience with the ability to continue the conversation.
And it looks noticeably more interesting.

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Microsoft Says Nearly 30% of Its Code Now Comes from AI

AI Now Writes a Big Chunk of Code at Microsoft and Google - Business Insider

Speaking at Meta’s LlamaCon, CEO Satya Nadella revealed that about 20‑30% of the code stored in Microsoft’s repositories is now produced by AI assistants such as GitHub Copilot. Most is in newer Python projects, less in legacy C++. He also noted that the share “keeps trending up,” putting Redmond on pace with Google’s own 30% benchmark and underscoring a rapid shift toward AI‑first software development.

On the one hand, I want to warn you against jumping to conclusions: after all, Microsoft is in the AI race and Satya is motivated to make such a statement. But at the same time, it overlaps with what the founders of OpenAI, Anthropic, and many others have said before. So the general trend is quite clear.

Tools for Humanity Introduces AI Device for Human Verification

Tools for Humanity, the startup behind the World Human Verification project co-founded by Sam Altman, has launched an AI device called the Orb Mini. It’s a phone-sized gadget designed to help users distinguish between humans and AI agents. Orb Mini does this by scanning a user’s eye to generate a unique blockchain-based identifier. Alongside the launch, the startup announced the opening of brick-and-mortar storefronts in several U.S. cities.

Right now, Tools for Humanity's activities seem rather inconsequential. However, with Altman among the founders, it seems their work will soon make a lot more sense.

Zurich Researchers Secretly Ran AI Persuasion Bots on Reddit

For four months ending in March 2025, a University of Zurich team ran 13 persona‑based chatbots on r/ChangeMyView, posting 1,500 custom arguments that secured more than 100 “delta” awards from users. A few days ago, moderators uncovered the scheme and called it undisclosed psychological manipulation and a breach of subreddit rules. Reddit locked the accounts, while the university opened an ethics inquiry after outside criticism that the study lacked consent and transparency.

Call me weird, but I don't see a serious ethical dilemma here.
I mean, yes, passing off bots as real people is not right. However, all the models acted within the rules of the subreddit: they reasoned, used rhetorical devices, and made arguments the way humans do.

Useful Tools ⚒️

Promptrepo – Create your own AI model using data in Google Sheets

FundSpark – Your AI copilot for fundraising & startup investing

AI Poster Generator – Free Online, No Sign-Up | Posterify

DeepWiki by Congnition – Understand Any GitHub Repo with AI Wikis

Promptaa – AI-enhanced and organized prompts

Promptaa is a simple platform designed to help users create, organize, and enhance AI prompts. It offers features like AI-powered prompt enhancement, allowing you to refine your prompts for better results with language models. You can categorize prompts, share them with the community, and explore tips created by others.