Gm. Happy August 16th, or as it’s better known, National Tell A Joke Day. So, in the spirit of the holiday, here’s a joke for you all. What do you call a fish without eyes? Fsh.

— Stephen Flanders

🏠 AI

The Google Get Back Plan

GPT-4 is the king of the AI mountain. That’s not up for debate.

But there are multiple players gunning for supremacy. Meta and Llama. Anthropic and Claude. X and…whatever they're doing.

And, of course, there’s Google, which has been going especially hard according to a new report from The Information.

More Details On Gemini

Google’s AI ambitions largely hinge on its new model, Gemini. Regular readers of the newsletter will remember Gemini from June.

But now, we have some more deets on what exactly Gemini is:

• Gemini will combine the text powers of a GPT-4 with the image powers of a Midjourney or Stable Diffusion.

• Gemini has been trained on a large amount of YouTube videos, opening the door to true multimodal capabilities (text, image, and video).

• Gemini will be able to analyze charts and create graphics with text descriptions.

• Gemini will be able to control software through text or voice commands.

• Gemini will power everything from Bard to Google Docs. Basically, AI will become a core part of most if not all of Google’s products.

Google is putting its best employees on Gemini, and they believe it’s the first model to truly be on par or exceed GPT-4.

Unfortunately, we won’t know if that’s true until they release it for app developers later this year.

A Culture Shift

Perhaps even more important than Google’s shiny new products is the culture shift that these products signify.

The ChatGPT crisis forced Google to start taking some risks again:

• They merged DeepMind and Brain despite the bad blood between the two.

• They quickly released and have constantly improved Bard.

• They’ve scrambled to integrate AI into all of their products.

Basically, Google is finally moving fast and breaking things.

Or as former Google executive Aydin Senkut put it, “Google is determined to be on the cutting edge again, instead of being extremely conservative”

The Big Picture: The OpenAI unipolar world is over. With Google, Meta, and Anthropic firmly in the arena, competition for AI supremacy is extremely tough.

🏠 TECH

A New App Store

There are few things more hated by tech companies than the Apple App Store. They hate the 30% toll. They hate the seemingly random and arbitrary review process. And they hate that there is nowhere else to turn.

Some fresh competition might help fix these things, but that’s pretty much impossible in the US right now. The App Store is on iPhones, which is controlled by Apple, and they aren’t going to willingly open the doors to competition.

But things are different across the pond. Thanks to the EU’s Digital Markets Act, Apple has to let other App Stores onto iPhones and iPads.

And software subscription service Setapp is taking advantage of the opportunity with the first alternative App Store:

• Will be available on a subscription basis.

• Will have a curated set of mobile apps.

• Will offer a 70/30 revenue split with devs when customers use their app.

• Will share 20% of revenue with devs who bring in new customers.

With the potential for an up to 90% revenue split, it will be interesting to see if Setapp can pry developers away from Apple.

However, even if they can’t, it’s almost assured that Setapp won’t be the final alternative app store. President of the App Store hater club Epic Games and blood rival Microsoft have both said they are seeking to enter the App Store business.

Let’s see if they can beat Apple at their own game.

The Bottom Line: More competition isn’t ideal for Apple, but might help regular consumers like us.

🏃‍♀️ QUICKIES

What else is going on?

• Apple is already using its chatbot for internal work.

• Netflix is getting into the gaming business.

• X is instituting 5 second-delays for websites Elon doesn’t like.

• Google’s AI search just got even better.

Stat: 100x: If you’re a dev, you need to read this post. Just trust.

Rabbit hole: Sci-Fi Idea Bank (Not Boring)

😂 WACKY AI WEDNESDAY

This summer heat wave be like:

🤥 3 LIES & A HEADLINE

News is so weird these days. Three of these headlines are fake stories from The Onion while one is actually true. Can you spot the truth amongst the fakes?

A. Ron DeSantis Booed Off Stage After Flashing His Stomach

B. CEO Promotes Self To Senior CEO

C. Crocodiles Are Drawn To The Cries Of Distressed Human Babies

D. Scooter Braun Announces Plan To Also Re-Record Taylor Swift

🛠️ FOUNDERS CORNER

The best resources we recently came across that will help you become a better founder, builder, or investor.

🧠 Algomo automates and optimizes your customer support with a ChatGPT-powered bot.

📊 ChartPixel turns your data into beautiful and insightful charts.

🚀 If you’re a founder, make sure your startup doesn’t lose its spark.

💉 DOPAMINE HIT

Maybe the cutest thing I’ve ever seen.

@lovelycute_baby

#cat #catsoftiktok

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3 LIES ANSWER

C.