ChatGPT’s recent phone number

Welcome, AI enthusiasts.

OpenAI just turned back the clock with a surprisingly retro option to access ChatGPT — and your parents’ landline will work just in addition to your smartphone.

With a brand new 800 ‘hotline’ number and WhatsApp integration, OpenAI just made accessing advanced AI so simple as dialing a friend. Let’s get into it…

In today’s AI rundown:

• ChatGPT gets a brand new phone number

• GitHub Copilot goes freemium

• Create infinite looping AI videos

• Perplexity hits $9B valuation in mega-round

• 5 recent AI tools & 5 recent AI jobs

• More AI & tech news

Read time: 4 minutes

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

OPENAI

☎️ ChatGPT gets a brand new phone number

The Rundown: OpenAI just launched a surprising recent option to access ChatGPT — through an old-school 1-800 number and in addition rolled out a brand new WhatsApp integration for global users during Day 10 of the corporate’s livestream event.

The main points:

• US users can now dial 1-800-CHATGPT to have voice conversations with the AI assistant, and they’ll receive quarter-hour of free calling time per 30 days.

• The phone service works on any device, from smartphones to vintage rotary phones — allowing accessibility without requiring modern tech.

• A parallel WhatsApp integration also lets international users text with ChatGPT, though with feature limitations in comparison with the principal app.

• The WhatsApp version runs on a lighter model with day by day usage caps, offering potential future upgrades like image evaluation.

Why it matters: The times of operators or hotlines are long gone, but OpenAI’s latest move brings that kind of information back to the AI age in an accessible way. By meeting users where they’re — whether on WhatsApp or a landline phone — OpenAI is expanding AI’s reach beyond the tech-savvy crowd.

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MICROSOFT & GITHUB

🆓 GitHub Copilot goes freemium

The Rundown: Microsoft-owned GitHub just announced a free tier of its AI coding Copilot available in its VS Code editor, marking a serious shift in AI coding accessibility as the corporate celebrates a milestone of 150M developers on the platform.

The main points:

• The brand new free tier offers 2,000 monthly code completions and 50 chat messages, integrated directly into VS Code and GitHub’s dashboard.

• Users can access Anthropic’s Claude 3.5 Sonnet or OpenAI’s GPT-4o models, with premium models (o1, Gemini 1.5 Pro) remaining exclusive to paid tiers.

• Free features include multi-file editing, terminal assistance, and project-wide context awareness for AI suggestions.

• GitHub also announced its 150M developer milestone, up from 100M in early 2023.

Why it matters: GitHub has lofty ambitions to achieve 1B developers globally, and removing price barriers would go a good distance toward onboarding the masses and stopping existing users from flocking to the opposite free options available on the market. The long run of AI coding is increasingly looking more like a fundamental free utility than a premium tool.

AI TRAINING

🎬 Create infinite looping AI videos

The Rundown: Sora’s AI video generator enables you to transform short videos right into a seamless loop that plays repeatedly without noticeable cuts or transitions.

Step-by-step:

1. Log into Sora together with your Plus/Pro subscription.

2. Generate your base video by describing continuous motion (e.g., “dogs running across the screen”).

3. Click the Loop button and select your loop type (Short/Normal/Long).

4. Export your seamless loop for web sites, social media, or digital displays.

Pro tip: For best results, select subjects with natural continuous motion and avoid sudden changes in direction or speed.

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PERPLEXITY

💰 Perplexity hits $9B valuation in mega-round

The Rundown: AI search startup Perplexity just secured an enormous $500M funding round, which triples its valuation to $9B, as the corporate continues to expand its challenge to traditional search engines like google and yahoo.

The main points:

• The corporate’s valuation has skyrocketed from $1B in April to $9B on this latest round, and the rise has come despite lawsuits from major publishers.

• Since its launch in 2022, Perplexity has attracted over 15M lively users, with recent feature additions including one-click shopping and financial evaluation.

• The startup has inked revenue-sharing deals with major publishers like Time and Fortune to handle content usage concerns.

• Perplexity also acquired Carbon, an information connectivity startup, to enable direct integration with platforms like Notion and Google Docs.

Why it matters: Perplexity’s rise is evidence of the shakeup underway within the search landscape, with other leaders like ChatGPT also rushing to show their very own platforms into modern search engines like google and yahoo. With heavyweights like Google also revamping seek for the AI age, will Perplexity have the opportunity to remain a step ahead of the industry giants?

NEW TOOLS & JOBS

Trending AI Tools

• 🎥 Meta Video Seal – Open-source tool embedding invisible, durable watermarks in videos to make sure authenticity

• 🏋️ Impakt AI App – AI coach that may see, talk, and instruct your workouts to guide you toward your personal fitness goals

• 👨‍💻 Tempo Labs – AI-powered visual editor for React, giving PMs, designers, and engineers the flexibility to collaborate visually on code

• 🎵 TemPolor – Royalty-free, AI-powered music platform designed to empower content creators with customizable music that enhances storytelling

• 🦦 Otterly AI – Monitor brand and link visibility on ChatGPT, Perplexity, and AIO

Recent AI Job Opportunities

• 📊 Databricks – Director TPM, Infrastructure

• 🌍 Anyscale – Regional Sales Director

• 💼 Runway – Sr. Technical Recruiter

• 🖥️ Abridge – IT Support Manager

• 📱 Siena – Social Media & Community Manager

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Microsoft reportedly acquired nearly 500,000 Hopper GPUs from Nvidia in 2024, emerging because the chipmaker’s biggest customer and nearly doubling the purchases from rivals like Meta and ByteDance.

Magnific AI released Magic Real, a brand new image generation model specializing in realistic outputs for professionals in architecture, photography, film, and interior design.

Odyssey revealed Explorer, a brand new generative world model that converts images into 3D environments, also adding Pixar co-founder Ed Catmull to its Board of Directors.

Open Vision Engineering introduced Pocket, a $79 physical AI-powered voice recorder that captures, transcribes, and organizes conversations.

Runway launched a brand new talent network platform, connecting AI filmmakers and production houses with brands and studios looking for expertise within the sector.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security unveiled DHSChat, an internally developed AI chatbot deployed on secure infrastructure for its 19,000 employees and agency users.

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Rowan, Joey, Zach, and Alvaro—aka The Rundown Team