91st Edition Download

Can you scale without chaos?

It's peak season, so volume's about to spike. Most teams either hire temps (expensive) or burn out their people (worse). See what smarter teams do: let AI handle predictable volume so your humans stay great.

Check your options

This Week in AI:

No jargon, no filler—just the biggest AI developments worth knowing right now. Perfect for quick industry insights, so you can skip the buzzwords and get straight to the good stuff. Let’s dive into this week’s AI shake-ups, just as promised:

DeepSeek is back at it again and released a reasoning model that rivals the best; Runway dropped a video generator that handles physical motion and realism; and Amazon’s chatbot appears to have meaningfully boosted Black Friday sales. Together, these updates show that AI is not stuck in hype cycles, it’s showing up where people work, create, and shop.

Let’s get into it.

In This Issue:

• DeepSeek V3.2 → A new Chinese model emerges as a serious challenger to premium LLMs, under an open license. (link)

• Runway Gen‑4.5→ A next-gen text-to-video tool that nails physics and motion better than previous versions. (link)

• Rufus at Amazon → On Black Friday, sessions using Rufus saw a steep lift in purchase conversions. (link)

🟣 DeepSeek V3.2

TL;DR:

DeepSeek released V3.2 (and a stronger variant, V3.2-Speciale), two reasoning-focused models — under an open-source license — that reportedly perform on par with state-of-the-art models (math, coding, reasoning benchmarks included). Their pricing is also much lower than many premium APIs.

Our Take:

This is meaningful for a few reasons. First: having a free or low-cost model that approaches “top-tier” performance puts pressure on premium providers to justify the cost gap. Second: open-source accessibility lowers barriers for startups and independent developers — potentially accelerating innovation in unexpected places or markets. But it also raises a flag: easier access + high power → the need for stronger safety, governance, and careful deployment.

🟣 Runway Gen-4.5

TL;DR:

Runway’s new Gen-4.5 shows big improvements in text-to-video generation, especially when it comes to realistic physics, human motion, and prompt adherence. Early benchmarks and user reports suggest it outperforms prior models in handling dynamic scenes more believably.

Our Take:

AI-generated video has often been held back by jittery motion, unrealistic physics, or off-timing. If Gen-4.5’s improvements hold in real-world use, it could lower the barrier for video content creation significantly — useful for marketers, educators, studios, and creators working with lean budgets. The broader implication: as video tools get better, video content may become cheaper, faster, and easier to scale — which could impact everything from advertising to social media storytelling.

🟣 Rufus at Amazon

TL;DR:

On Black Friday, sessions on Amazon that used the Rufus chatbot saw purchase rates that were 100% higher compared with the preceding month; in contrast, non-Rufus sessions saw only a 20% increase.

Our Take:

This suggests AI-powered shopping assistance isn’t just a nice preview — it’s becoming a meaningful lever in e-commerce. For retailers, embedding chatbots or recommendation agents could shift from optional to essential. For consumers, AI tools like Rufus may change how we shop, research deals, or discover products. That said — as shopping becomes more guided, transparency and trust (about recommendations, privacy, biases) matter more than ever.