👀 TLDR

In this week’s What’s Appening, we cover the first major change to ChatGPT’s interface. Canvas is a new tool that helps ChatGPT become a collaborator in writing and coding; OpenAI claims it’s more accurate, too. We also have news on a big court win for Epic, Facebook’s bid to win over GenZ, iOS 18.1’s release date, and more. A familiar name is our App of the Week, and our Stat looks at the challengers to Google’s search advertising hegemony.

🎬 Our Top Take

🎨📝OpenAI – A New Way to Code and Write with ChatGPT Canvas

We sense a shift change at OpenAI, focusing on new approaches to AI rather than just creating bigger – and more expensive to run – underlying LLM models. First, there was Strawberry, which offered a new functioning of the model itself, and now “Canvas”, which is the first major change to ChatGPT’s interface since its inception. In a nutshell, Canvas (now in beta but looking suspiciously like Claude’s Artifacts) is a collaboration tool that allows you and ChatGPT to work on the specifics of a project: Editing, debugging, porting to Python, JavaScript, etc., and revisions to specific bits of writing or code. OpenAI’s testing claims working with Canvas – built on GPT-4o – makes ChatGPT more succinct & targeted, outperforming ‘zero-shot’ ChatGPT answers by 30% in accuracy and 16% in quality. Once out of beta, OpenAI plans to make Canvas available to both paid and free subscribers. #BlankCanvas Read more here.

📍 Meanwhile at 3Advance

It’s October already! Can you believe it? Halloween is just around the corner and next thing we know it will be the Holidays. So… Are you still sitting on that 2024 goal to make things better? If it’s a digital product, an app, a website or you wanna use AI to supercharge operations, maybe it’s time you hit us up. We’ve got a few sprints left to fill before the end of the year, and it doesn’t take long to build functional prototypes these days. A focused sprint now may lead to big things next year.

📲 App of the Week: The New York Times

Not a new app, of course, but the NYT app has had a big makeover, one it calls “our most consequential redesign yet.” The idea was to improve the UX, transforming it from a single feed to, in their words, an expanded “canvas” – that really is the mot du jour. Content rather than design is always going to be the deal-breaker for the NYT subscribers, but we like the swipeable functions and increased focus on visuals. It’s a solid upgrade. Check out the Times’ take on it and demo here.

🧐 Stat of the Week: <50%

📈📉 Google – Search Ad Dominance is Falling and Expected to Decline Further

The WSJ claims Google’s years-long dominance in search advertising is slipping. It’s predicted to fall further next year, dipping below 50% for the first time since 2014. The challenge comes not from rival search engines but new ways to search with social media and AI. Amazon, too, has seen its market share rise to 22.3%. #GoogleSlips Read more here.

🗞️ Other Stories

✍️ Quote of the Week:

An oldie but a goodie. In line with our theme from Meanwhile, you will never reach your destination without taking a first step. Even if you aren’t certain where you’re headed.

📣 Promos

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