#246 - Gemini 3.5 + Omni, Musk Loses, OpenAI vs Erdős
Last Week in AI
May 25
#246 - Gemini 3.5 + Omni, Musk Loses, OpenAI vs Erdős
#246 - Gemini 3.5 + Omni, Musk Loses, OpenAI vs Erdős

Last Week in AI
May 25
Shownote
Shownote
Our 246th episode with a summary and discussion of last week's big AI news!
Recorded on 05/22/2026
Hosted by Andrey Kurenkov [https://twitter.com/andrey_kurenkov] and Jeremie
Harris [https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremieharris/]
Feel free to email us your questions and feedback at andreyvkurenkov@gmail.com
and/or hello@gladstone.ai [hello@gladstone.ai]
Read out our text newsletter and comment on the podcast at
https://lastweekin.ai/ [https://lastweekin.ai/]
In this episode:
* Google I/O highlights included Gemini 3.5 (with 3.5 Flash emphasized for
speed and benchmarks), the always-on agent Gemini Spark running on Google
Cloud with MCP tool support, and Gemini Omni multimodal video
generation/editing, plus updates like Anti-Gravity 2.0, Gemini for Science,
and Genie world-model navigation using Street View and Waymo simulation.
* Coding-agent competition accelerated with Cursor Composer 2.5 (fine-tuned on
Moonshot’s Kimi K2.5) and xAI’s early Grok Build release, alongside
discussion of potential Cursor–xAI ties and xAI’s talent churn and compute
utilization concerns.
* Business and legal updates included Elon Musk losing his OpenAI lawsuit on
statute-of-limitations grounds, reported OpenAI–Apple partnership tensions,
Anthropic agreeing to a $30B funding round at a $900B valuation and
projecting its first profitable quarter, and Cerebras’ IPO surging about 90%.
* Research and safety stories covered OpenAI’s result on an 80-year-old Erdős
geometry problem, findings on “negation neglect” in training,
interpretability work showing multiple redundant circuits per capability,
agent benchmarks like Terminal World, new deepfake takedown enforcement under
the Take It Down Act, demonstrations of autonomous hacking/self-replication,
rapidly improving AI cyber capabilities, and steps toward image provenance
metadata and watermarks.
Timestamps:
* (00:00:10) Intro / Banter
* (00:01:15) News Preview
* Tools & Apps
* (00:05:05) Google unveils AI model Gemini 3.5 and AI agent Gemini Spark
[https://www.cnbc.com/2026/05/19/google-ai-ultra-gemini-spark-omni.html]
* (00:11:43) Google's Gemini Omni turns images, audio, and text into video —
and that's just the start | TechCrunch
[https://techcrunch.com/2026/05/19/googles-gemini-omni-turns-images-audio-and-text-into-video-and-thats-just-the-start/]
* (00:17:27) Google launches Antigravity 2.0 with an updated desktop app and
CLI tool at IO 2026 | TechCrunch
[https://techcrunch.com/2026/05/19/google-launches-antigravity-2-0-with-an-updated-desktop-app-and-cli-tool-at-io-2026/]
* (00:22:35) Google Debuts AI-Powered Tools To Optimize Scientific Research
Workflows
[https://www.engadget.com/2177120/google-debuts-ai-powered-tools-to-optimize-scientific-research-workflows/]
* (00:27:20) Google’s Genie world model can now simulate real streets with
Street View | TechCrunch
[https://techcrunch.com/2026/05/19/googles-genie-world-model-can-now-simulate-real-streets-with-street-view/]
* (00:29:51) Cursor's Composer 2.5 matches Opus 4.7 and GPT-5.5 benchmarks at a
fraction of the cost
[https://the-decoder.com/cursors-composer-2-5-matches-opus-4-7-and-gpt-5-5-benchmarks-at-a-fraction-of-the-cost/]
* (00:37:37) xAI Introduces Its Coding Agent Called Grok Build
[https://www.engadget.com/2173482/xai-coding-agent-grok-build/]
* Applications & Business
* (00:41:55) Musk loses OpenAI court battle as he waited too long to sue
[https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cewpyv79pw1o]
* (00:48:08) Anthropic agrees terms of $30bn funding deal at $900bn valuation
[https://www.ft.com/content/9deae3c6-716d-4f4d-8b09-434d8519f847]
* (00:53:12) OpenAI co-founder Andrej Karpathy joins Anthropic's pre-training
team | TechCrunch
[https://techcrunch.com/2026/05/19/openai-co-founder-andrej-karpathy-joins-anthropics-pre-training-team/]
* (00:56:49) Greg Brockman Officially Takes Control of OpenAI’s Products in
Latest Shake-Up | WIRED
[https://www.wired.com/story/openai-reorg-greg-brockman-product/]
* (00:58:15) OpenAI-Apple Partnership Frays, Setting Up Possible Legal Fight -
Bloomberg
[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-05-14/openai-apple-partnership-frays-setting-up-possible-legal-fight?srnd=phx-technology]
* (01:01:13) AI chipmaker Cerebras soars 90% in year’s biggest IPO so far
[https://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/ai-chipmaker-cerebras-soars-90-years-biggest-ipo-far-rcna345128]
* Research & Advancements
* (01:07:10) AI just solved an 80-year-old ‘Erdős problem,’ and mathematicians
are amazed | Scientific American
[https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/ai-just-solved-an-80-year-old-erdos-problem-and-mathematicians-are-amazed/]
* (01:11:50) Negation Neglect: When models fail to learn negations in training
[https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.13829]
* (01:13:18) All Circuits Lead to Rome: Rethinking Functional Anisotropy in
Circuit and Sheaf Discovery for LLMs [https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.12671]
* (01:16:20) Autonomous AI research for nanogpt speedrun
[https://www.primeintellect.ai/auto-nanogpt]
* (01:21:59) TerminalWorld: Benchmarking Agents on Real-World Terminal Tasks
[https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.22535]
* Policy & Safety
* (01:23:15) America’s dangerous, messy deepfakes crackdown is here | The Verge
[https://www.theverge.com/policy/933518/take-it-down-act-notice-removal-social-media-deepfake]
* (01:25:17) Language Models Can Autonomously Hack and Self-Replicate
[https://palisaderesearch.org/blog/self-replication]
* (01:28:48) How fast is autonomous AI cyber capability advancing?
[https://www.aisi.gov.uk/blog/how-fast-is-autonomous-ai-cyber-capability-advancing]
* (01:31:32) Positive Alignment: Artificial Intelligence for Human Flourishing
[https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.10310]
* Synthetic Media & Art
* (01:33:15) OpenAI is making it easier to check if an image was made by their
models | TechCrunch
[https://techcrunch.com/2026/05/19/openai-is-making-it-easier-to-check-if-an-image-was-made-by-their-models/]
* (01:33:56) How Chinese short dramas became AI content machines | MIT
Technology Review
[https://www.technologyreview.com/2026/05/15/1137326/chinese-short-dramas-ai/?mc_cid=93098036bb]
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy [https://art19.com/privacy] and
California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info
[https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info].
Highlights
Highlights
This episode covers a packed week in AI news, headlined by Google's major announcements at I/O and significant shifts in the competitive landscape for coding agents and frontier labs. The hosts also delve into a major legal ruling, a staggering funding round, and new research on AI capabilities and safety.
Chapters
Chapters
Intro / Banter
00:00News Preview
01:15Tools & Apps
Google unveils AI model Gemini 3.5 and AI agent Gemini Spark
05:05Google's Gemini Omni turns images, audio, and text into video — and that's just the start | TechCrunch
11:43Google launches Antigravity 2.0 with an updated desktop app and CLI tool at IO 2026 | TechCrunch
17:27Google Debuts AI-Powered Tools To Optimize Scientific Research Workflows
22:35Google’s Genie world model can now simulate real streets with Street View | TechCrunch
27:20Cursor's Composer 2.5 matches Opus 4.7 and GPT-5.5 benchmarks at a fraction of the cost
29:51xAI Introduces Its Coding Agent Called Grok Build
37:37Applications & Business
Musk loses OpenAI court battle as he waited too long to sue
41:55Anthropic agrees terms of $30bn funding deal at $900bn valuation
48:08OpenAI co-founder Andrej Karpathy joins Anthropic's pre-training team | TechCrunch
53:12Greg Brockman Officially Takes Control of OpenAI’s Products in Latest Shake-Up | WIRED
56:49OpenAI-Apple Partnership Frays, Setting Up Possible Legal Fight - Bloomberg
58:15AI chipmaker Cerebras soars 90% in year’s biggest IPO so far
1:01:13Research & Advancements
AI just solved an 80-year-old ‘Erdős problem,’ and mathematicians are amazed | Scientific American
1:07:10Negation Neglect: When models fail to learn negations in training
1:11:50All Circuits Lead to Rome: Rethinking Functional Anisotropy in Circuit and Sheaf Discovery for LLMs
1:13:18Autonomous AI research for nanogpt speedrun
1:16:20TerminalWorld: Benchmarking Agents on Real-World Terminal Tasks
1:21:59Policy & Safety
America’s dangerous, messy deepfakes crackdown is here | The Verge
1:23:15Language Models Can Autonomously Hack and Self-Replicate
1:25:17How fast is autonomous AI cyber capability advancing?
1:28:48Positive Alignment: Artificial Intelligence for Human Flourishing
1:31:32Synthetic Media & Art
OpenAI is making it easier to check if an image was made by their models | TechCrunch
1:33:15How Chinese short dramas became AI content machines | MIT Technology Review
1:33:56Transcript
Transcript
Andrey Kurenkov: Hello, and welcome to the Last Week in AI podcast, where you can hear us chat about what's going on with AI. As usual, in this episode, we will summarize and discuss some of last week's most interesting AI news. You can also check out our ...
