The Weekly Download #96: Apple's AI Plans Leaked (And They're Huge)

Hey , it’s Sunday, August 3, 2025.

This week's newsletter features news about Apple developing its own AI answer engine to compete with ChatGPT, aiming for smarter search and stronger privacy.

Meanwhile, Mark Zuckerberg pitches AI glasses as a must-have, Stack Overflow finds developers use but don’t fully trust AI tools, and Google briefly exposed private ChatGPT chats to public search.

On the gadget front, Brilliant Labs’ $299 Halo AI Glasses promise private, long-term memory recall and real-time assistance—all processed locally for privacy.

Plus: scammers are targeting more states, Nintendo raises Switch prices, and OpenAI launches a step-by-step learning mode in ChatGPT.

Alright, and we’re off!

🤑 GIVEAWAY

If you haven't entered already, there’s still plenty of time to enter our BLUETTI giveaway. And if you have already entered, you can gain more entries by completing additional actions on the checklist. Click the button below for more details. The giveaway is running now through August 28th. Good luck!

📝 How-To

The 2-Tool Productivity Hack That Actually Works

Tired of downloading another productivity app that you'll forget about in a week? Same.

Instead of adding to your tool stack, let's strip it down. Here's how to dramatically boost your productivity using just 2 tools you already have on your phone.

Tool #1: Your Timer

Your time is gone once it's spent. That's why a simple timer becomes your best accountability partner.

Two ways to use it:

Beat procrastination with the 5-minute rule - Commit to just 5 minutes on that task you're avoiding. You'll often find yourself working way longer once you start.

Stay focused with timeboxing - Set a goal, start the timer, work with full attention. That dopamine hit when it goes off? Chef's kiss.

Pro tip: The Pomodoro Technique (25-minute work blocks) works great, but don't overthink it. Any timed focus session beats endless scrolling.

Tool #2: iPhone Notes

Best ideas hit at the worst times - in the shower, during a run, right before sleep. Capture them or lose them forever.

Keep your phone accessible everywhere. The Beatles didn't have iPhones, but they always had pen and paper ready. Same principle.

iPhone Notes isn't just basic text anymore:

• Rich formatting

• Checklists

• Document scanning

• Real-time collaboration

Use it for everything from meeting notes to random 3 am business ideas.

The Bottom Line

The fanciest productivity system means nothing if you don't actually use it. These two tools work because they're already in your pocket and take zero setup.

Your productivity system should serve you, not the other way around.

What's your current productivity setup? Hit reply and let me know - I'm always curious how people stay organized.

📩 Newsletters Worth Reading

tl;dr sec.
Join >90,000 security professionals getting the best tools, talks, and resources right in their inbox for free. [LINK]

Newsletter Operator
Learn how to grow and monetize your newsletter. Trusted by 50,000+ founders, CEOs, and creators. [LINK]

Status
Scoops and insights on the media and tech industries, hitting inboxes six days a week [LINK]

 📚 Tech Terms Worth Knowing

Ferrite Bead
(noun)

Definition: A small, cylindrical component—usually black—found on electronic cables. Made from magnetic ceramic (ferrite) material, its primary purpose is to suppress electromagnetic interference (EMI) by acting as a low-pass filter

Function:

• Prevents electronic devices from interfering with each other.

• Protects sensitive equipment from external radio frequency noise.

• Commonly seen on computer cables, power adapters, and high-speed data lines.

Usage: "The chunky black cylinder on your laptop charger is a ferrite bead, quietly fending off electromagnetic chaos."

📰 The Big One

Apple is building the ChatGPT rival it swore it didn’t want

Apple has quietly established a new internal team to develop its own artificial intelligence search engine that could directly compete with ChatGPT, marking a departure from its previous reluctance to build in-house chatbot technology.

Full rundown:

• A new internal team called “Answers, Knowledge, and Information” is leading Apple’s project to build a cloud-powered AI answer engine, reportedly hiring aggressively in both Silicon Valley and Beijing.

• Former Siri chief Robby Walker is heading the initiative, aiming to move Apple beyond its tarnished reputation for sluggish Siri updates and lackluster AI performance.

• The strategy shift coincides with growing challenges to Apple’s $20 billion Google search deal and industry-wide demand for smarter, real-time, web-crawling AI in products like Siri, Spotlight, and Safari.

Why it matters: If Apple cracks the code and delivers real-time, reliable answers without betraying its promise of privacy, it could spark the biggest shift in how we search, learn, and make decisions since the iPhone itself. But that’s a massive “if.” [LINK]

⚡ Fast Five

1.) Meta CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, warns people without AI glasses will face "cognitive disadvantage"
Mark Zuckerberg claims users without AI-powered eyewear will be at a significant disadvantage. In other words, he’s asking you to buy his company’s smart glasses. [LINK]

2.) Stack Overflow survey finds growing use of and distrust in AI tools
Stack Overflow's survey shows 84% of developers use AI tools, yet distrust jumped from 31% to 46% in one year. [LINK]

3.) Google indexes thousands of private ChatGPT conversations
Google made private chats publicly searchable. I repeat, GOOGLE MADE PRIVATE CHATS PUBLICLY SEARCHABLE [LINK]

4.) Google backtracks on plan to shut down all goo.gl links
Google will keep active goo.gl links but delete inactive ones after nine months of warnings. [LINK].

5.) Anthropic cuts off OpenAI's Claude access over GPT-5 benchmarking claims
Anthropic has cut off OpenAI’s access to the Claude API after claims that OpenAI used Claude to benchmark its systems before the launch of GPT-5. [LINK]

PARTNER MESSAGE

Better inputs. Sharper outputs. Download the guide to premium AI.

Building or refining generative AI models? This guide shows why scraped data falls short—and what to use instead. Learn how real-world behavior signals, clustering, semantic scoring, and visual diversity improve output. Plus, see how Shutterstock’s licensed data and services reduce risk and boost performance. Train smarter, faster, and more responsibly.

Download the guide

💾 Extra Bytes

Scammers increasingly target these 5 states with fake local calls [LINK]

Americans rank near the bottom in AI politeness, reports study [LINK]

IRS pulls plug on free tax filing program after just two years [LINK]

Reddit Answers is gunning for Google’s crown—will it succeed? [LINK]

Nintendo raises Switch prices after new tariffs—here’s what you’ll pay [LINK]

Epic scores another win as court slams Google’s app store monopoly [LINK]

How Trump’s trade war is still messing with your next iPhone [LINK]

Anthropic overtakes OpenAI as best AI provider for businesses [LINK]

TikTok launches Footnotes to let users add context to videos [LINK]

Trump and big tech want to fix your medical records [LINK]

OpenAI launches Study Mode in ChatGPT for step-by-step learning [LINK]

📱 Gear of the Week

Brilliant Labs Halo AI Glasses

Singapore-based startup Brilliant Labs has unveiled its second-generation smart glasses called Halo, priced competitively at $299 and aimed at bringing AI-powered memory assistance to everyday eyewear.

The lightweight glasses, weighing just over 40 grams, feature the company's new Narrative system that can remember names of people you meet and recall conversations "years or even decades later."

What’s cool:

• The lightweight glasses (40g) can remember names and conversations for decades, converting all sensory data into irreversible mathematical representations for privacy.

• Powered by an advanced AI chip, Halo includes a microOLED display, bone conduction speakers, and 14-hour battery life—triple that of Meta's Ray-Ban smart glasses.

• All data is processed locally, never sent to the cloud, and users have full control with instant voice commands.

• The glasses are fully programmable and open source, encouraging customization by developers and hobbyists.

The bottom line: 

For most people, this means you get the combined power of an AI assistant and a personal, long-term memory boost on your face, without sacrificing privacy or breaking the bank.

⚙️ Moron of the Week

This week’s moron(s) of the week goes to the jerk at OpenAI who thought this was actually a great idea and something its users actually wanted [LINK]

⚙️ Tools

Gemini Deep Think: Google’s top math-solving model, winner of an international competition, is now in the Gemini App for Ultra subscribers. [LINK].

AlphaEarth Foundations: Google’s AI model for on-demand maps [LINK]

Meka Agent: An open-source, autonomous computer-using agent that delivers state-of-the-art browsing capabilities. [LINK]

Text Expander: A typing productivity tool that makes it easier to store, organize, access, and share a library of your most commonly used phrases anywhere you type. [LINK]

Thanks for reading!

Alright! Thanks for getting all the way to the end. Until next week…….

-Kevin

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