CULTURE

AI video tools stoke Hollywood ire

As the race to create the best AI video generation model heats up, so has the backlash from the entertainment industry. 

The debut of OpenAI’s Sora 2 and its accompanying Sora app quickly gave way to intellectual property concerns as dupes and deepfakes flooded the internet. Additionally, people quickly found workarounds to remove watermarks from Sora content, raising concerns about the potential for disinformation and fraud. 

And Sora might not be the only video generation model to worry about. 

• On Tuesday, xAI released Imagine v0.9, the company’s latest video generation model, which boasts improved visual quality, motion and audio generation capabilities. 

• Leaks of Google’s Veo 3.1 have also begun circulating, claiming that the new model features better facial consistency, cinematic presents and multi-shot scene generation. 

OpenAI noted that in order for their content not to be used, copyright holders must opt out. This has caused an uproar in Hollywood: The Creative Artists Agency, United Talent Agency and WME, the three biggest talent houses in the industry, have all taken a stand against the platform, many opting out their clients. 

Creative Artists Agency stated on Wednesday that Sora “exposes our clients and their intellectual property to significant risk.” United Talent Agency, meanwhile, called Sora 2 exploitative, saying in a statement that “There is no substitute for human talent in our business.” 

Motion Picture Association Chairman and CEO Charles Rivkin called on OpenAI to take "immediate and decisive action” to fight copyright infringement on its platform on Tuesday.

The fallout of this will likely lead to a whole lot of lawsuits. Legal action for copyright has already started to pile up against major model providers. However, as these models get better and better at generating realistic content, disinformation and deepfakes may pose an even greater threat, creating both more legal battles and a media literacy landscape that’s harder for consumers to navigate.

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STARTUPS

Reflection raise highlights open source hype

Open source AI is catching eyes.

On Thursday, Reflection AI announced a $2 billion funding round led by chip giant Nvidia. The company at $8 billion, skyrocketing it from its $545 million valuation in March. 

Reflection, a startup founded in 2024 that makes most of its revenue from its automated software development tools, has made it its mission to develop a Western equivalent to the Chinese firm DeepSeek, which rose to prominence earlier this year. 

• The raise signals a growing interest in open source AI among investors and developers alike. But compared to DeepSeek, U.S. development is behind, argues Misha Laskin, co-founder and CEO of Reflection. 

• Laskin told the New York Times that “There’s a DeepSeek-shaped hole in the U.S., which I think is what makes it critical for a lab like ours to exist.” 

And while open source AI has its benefits, including collaborative innovation and accessibility, nothing in this life is free, said Aaron Bockelie, senior principal consultant and AI solutions lead at Cprime. 

Truly open source development projects tend to have trouble staying financially solvent, Bockelie said, leading them to constantly require funding. Often, he noted, open source models often work in a “shareware” way, Bockelie said, allowing users a “first taste of what it could be like” without offering full access unless they pay. 

“Open source AI means well … but money is too much of a temptation,” said Bockelie. “The amount of money you put into open source projects and software tools versus what comes out of it is completely perversely off balance.”

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INFRASTRUCTURE

Base Power raises $1 billion to fix U.S. grid

As AI continues to pose a challenge to the power grid, investors are seeking solutions. 

Base Power, a startup developing home batteries to support the U.S. power grid, announced a $1 billion Series C funding round on Wednesday at a valuation of $3 billion. The startup’s backers include Addition, Andreessen Horowitz, Thrive Capital and Lightspeed. 

Base Power, founded in 2023, leases out batteries to homeowners, later using them when energy is needed to support the grid. Over the past two years, the company has deployed more than 100 megawatts of battery capacity. 

Zachary Dell, founder of Base Power and son of Dell CEO and founder Michael Dell, told Yahoo Finance on Thursday that this tech aims to tackle "unprecedented energy demand” in the U.S.

“The grid is certainly under stress, and we're here to help resolve some of that stress,” Dell said on Opening Bid. 

Major AI firms are investing billions in AI data centers, with Project Stargate alone representing one of the largest infrastructure buildouts in history. But the question remains of whether the U.S. power grid can keep up. 

The International Energy Agency projects that global electricity demand from data centers will reach approximately 945 terawatt-hours by 2030, surpassing the total electricity consumption of Japan, largely driven by the increasing use of AI. The U.S. is projected to account for half of that growth.

LINKS

• Audio AI firm David AI raises $50 million in Series B

• OpenAI’s Codex is catching up to Anthropic’s Claude Code in some metrics

• One in 5 high schoolers have or know someone with romantic relationships with AI

• OpenAI warns EU antitrust chief of harm caused by Big Tech’s data conduct

• Microsoft’s data center frenzy will likely continue into 2026

• Agentic AI startup Kernel raises $22 million in Series A

• Otter.ai Enterprise Suite: The voice transcription platform has added features to easily integrate into the enterprise, including agentic features and MCP connectivity.

• Gemini Enterprise: A new suite of enterprise tools, including a no-code work bench, prebuilt agents and a central governance framework.

• Adobe Agents: Adobe launched AI agents aimed at B2B marketers. 

• Plural: A control panel for platforms teams, this tool brings AI to development operations by centralizing Kubernetes clusters. 

• Nyra AI: An AI-powered tech stack that helps you launch ad campaigns across Google, Meta and TikTok. 

• Glue: A platform for agentic team chat, allowing humans and agents to collaborate seamlessly.

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• Finding the right talent for computer vision was like searching for a needle in a haystack—until Athyna made it simple. The specialist we hired streamlined our QA process and boosted visual accuracy to 97%. Stack: PyTorch, OpenVINO, Azure IoT, Docker, Kubernetes. Reduced time-to-hire from 60 to 9 days.

GAMES

A QUICK POLL BEFORE YOU GO