A Fine Spectacle 🕶️🫠

👀 TLDR

In this week’s What’s Appening, we cover Meta’s big launch of Ray-Ban Display, the first smartglasses with a built-in AR screen. The reveal at Meta Connect was a bit of a mess, leaving Mark Zuckerberg red-faced on stage, but did it do enough to persuade folks to pay almost $800 for the AI-enabled specs? We also have news on the merry-go-round of AI funding, look at how a baseball team used an AI coach, highlight Zoom’s new features, and more!

🔥 Vibe & Validate with 3A: Workshop, Prototype and Roadmap in ONE Week 🔥

🎬 Our Top Take

🕶️🫠 Meta – Connect 2025 Launches First AI Glasses with AR Display

While we can’t make assumptions, we could take a stab at saying that you probably don’t own smart glasses yet. Sales of Meta’s Ray-Ban range have been in the low single-digit millions globally since launch, not enough to get out of the niche bracket, yet Mark Zuckerberg has been keen to tell the world’s media this week that he sees billions of units being shipped within a few years, even replacing the smartphone. The bold claim comes after Meta Connect 2025, where Zuckerberg unveiled the world’s first smart glasses with a built-in AR display. Previous versions had cameras, microphones, etc., but this is the first time users will get an Iron Man’s JARVIS-like screen in front of their eyes. Of course, Zuck would love it if everyone was talking about that, but they weren’t: the on-stage demo was a complete disaster, with flubbed live demonstrations and Zuck himself floundering when he couldn’t make a video call. Meta blamed the WIFI, calling it a demo fail, not a product fail.  And to be fair, there was enough impressive stuff on show, including the integration of the AI chatbot, live translations, and indexing of the real-world around you, to have some optimism. Investors seemed to like what they saw, too. The new glasses, called Meta Ray-Ban Display, will go on sale on September 30th  in the US (2026 in ROW), but we should warn you, they cost $799, making it a price hike of over 100% from the previous generation. #FineSpectacle Read more here.

📲 App of the Week: Huxe

With the success of Google’s NotebookLM, it was perhaps inevitable that we would see some similar ‘personal audio companions’ get some traction. Huxe, which is now on general release after an invite-only launch in June, can certainly be tagged in that way, but it’s turning heads as the team behind it, including Raiza Martin and Jason Spielman, worked on NotebookLM up until last December. With Huxe, they offer their own spin on AI note-taking, mini podcast generation, and the rest, while also offering something different, notably its ability to create a live station based on specific topics. There are other aesthetic differences, too, but if you are looking for a NotebookLM alternative, Huxe could be the one for you. Check it out for iOS here and Android here.

🧐 Stat of the Week: $4T

📈📉 AI – Jensen Huang Lays Out Immense Cost of Infrastructure Deals

This week, NVIDIA announced a $100B investment in OpenAI, which barely made a ripple across the MSM. The week before, OpenAI made a deal to invest $60 billion in Oracle compute. The latter two also signed a $300B cloud deal. The sums are vast, of course, but also evidence of the merry-go-round between AI-centered companies. Jensen Huang has been talking about it, saying we could be looking at up to $4T in these investments by the end of the decade. Some financial analysts are worried that the “you invest in me, and we will invest in them” approach from AI companies may be fueling a huge financial bubble. #AIBubble Read more here.

🗞️ Other Stories

📍 Meanwhile at 3Advance

The Quiet Collection’s Birthday Collection has been out for just a couple of weeks, and it’s already finding its people. Short, reflective sessions that you can press play on during your birthday week – some for pausing, some for looking ahead, some just for celebrating yourself – are being listened to and gifted to friends. Mark and the team did an amazing job bringing it to life. It’s thoughtful, fun, and exciting to see it resonate with people in such a short time. From first play to gifting to someone else, it’s becoming a companion for birthdays, exactly as it was meant to be. And if you haven’t pressed play yet, now’s probably a good time – the Birthday Collection is waiting.