🤖 DeepSeek drops V3.1 challenging OpenAI & Anthropic 🤖
Chinese AI lab releases open-source model rivaling proprietary giants

DeepSeek's latest V3.1 model packs 685 billion parameters, giving it enhanced working memory for longer conversations and complex reasoning tasks. The open-source model scores 71.6% on the prestigious Aider coding benchmark, matching Claude Opus 4 performance while costing just $1.01 per coding task compared to nearly $70 for proprietary alternatives. This release intensifies competition in the foundation model space as Chinese companies continue pushing boundaries.

🧠 Microsoft AI CEO warns about seemingly conscious AI 🧠
AI chief calls research into model welfare "dangerous" as tech giants clash

Microsoft AI CEO Mustafa Suleyman published an essay warning about "Seemingly Conscious AI" that can mimic sentience and convince users they deserve protections. He highlighted rising cases of "AI psychosis" and called the study of model welfare "both premature and frankly dangerous". The warning puts Microsoft at odds with Anthropic's extensive research into AI consciousness and model welfare. Suleyman urged companies to build AI "for people, not to be a person."

📉 MIT study triggers AI stock selloff as companies show zero returns 📉
Wall Street reality check sends shockwaves through AI sector

An MIT study found that 95% of companies are getting "zero return" from their AI investments, combined with Sam Altman's admission that investors may be getting "over excited" about the sector. The reality check sent Nvidia stock down 3.5%, Palantir plummeting 9.4%, and the Nasdaq posted its biggest single-day drop since August. The findings challenge the widespread AI investment frenzy gripping markets as pilots fail to deliver measurable P&L impact.

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📄 Adobe rolls out AI-powered workspace to tame document chaos 📄

Adobe launched 'Acrobat Studio', an AI-powered workspace designed to manage multiple PDF documents. The centerpiece "PDF Spaces" feature lets users deploy AI assistants to summarize, analyze, and chat about document collections. Users can create custom AI assistants for different tasks, though it currently only works with English documents. The launch targets professionals juggling complex document workflows from sales presentations to contract management.

🎨 Alibaba drops powerful open-source image editing model 🎨

Alibaba's Qwen team released Qwen-Image-Edit, a 20B parameter open-source model that handles pixel-perfect edits and style transformations while keeping original characters intact. The model achieves SOTA performance across editing benchmarks, beating rivals like Seedream and FLUX. It supports bilingual text editing and allows multiple edits to stack on top of each other. The release demonstrates China's continued push in open-source AI development.