Thursday News Edition

Meta Buys the Hottest AI Startup

🎉 Happy New Year 🎉

Meta buys a money-making AI agent startup, Notion turns into an automation hub, and Adobe taps Runway to power the next wave of AI video.

Here’s what’s inside:

Top Story → Meta just bought Manus for $2B
AI Agents → Notion introduces custom workspace agents
AI Video → Adobe gets early access to Runway Gen-4.5

And more…

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The Future of Shopping? AI + Actual Humans.

AI has changed how consumers shop by speeding up research. But one thing hasn’t changed: shoppers still trust people more than AI.

Levanta’s new Affiliate 3.0 Consumer Report reveals a major shift in how shoppers blend AI tools with human influence. Consumers use AI to explore options, but when it comes time to buy, they still turn to creators, communities, and real experiences to validate their decisions.

The data shows:

• Only 10% of shoppers buy through AI-recommended links

• 87% discover products through creators, blogs, or communities they trust

• Human sources like reviews and creators rank higher in trust than AI recommendations

The most effective brands are combining AI discovery with authentic human influence to drive measurable conversions.

Affiliate marketing isn’t being replaced by AI, it’s being amplified by it.

Download the full report to see what this means for your brand.

Meta has acquired Manus, the AI startup that became famous last year for its agent that screens candidates, plans vacations, and analyzes stocks.

Manus raised $75 million in April at a $500 million valuation and quickly hit millions of users with over $100 million in annual recurring revenue. Meta paid $2 billion, giving it a rare AI product already making real money while pressure builds over Meta’s $60 billion AI infrastructure spending.

Meta says all Chinese ties will be cut and operations in China will end.

YouTube has introduced Playables Builder, an AI tool that lets creators build simple games without writing code.

Powered by Gemini 3, it converts text descriptions, images, or video clips into playable game prototypes that can run on YouTube’s app or website.

Creators can turn ideas like puzzle or runner concepts into games in minutes and share them directly with their audience.

YouTube has already worked with creators to launch example games such as Sugar Cube, Bucha Blocks, Study Zone, and Dirt Runner.

Notion is adding custom AI agents that automate tasks inside and outside your workspace. You will be able to create agents from a sidebar menu, use templates like daily email summaries, and fine-tune settings such as name, icon, triggers, and permissions.

You can allow limited web access, plug into external tools, and choose which AI model powers each agent.

Notion is already using these agents internally to automate workflows, and early testing shows support for image generation.

Adobe has signed a multi-year deal with Runway to bring Runway’s latest generative video models into Adobe’s creative tools.

Runway’s new Gen-4.5 model is now available in Adobe Firefly, giving creators early access before its wider release. Adobe becomes Runway’s preferred API partner, meaning new Runway models will reach Firefly users first.

Creators can generate scenes with Gen-4.5, move clips into Firefly’s video editor, and then refine them in Premiere or After Effects.

ElevenLabs has upgraded Eleven Music into a full music platform instead of just a generator.

You can now browse and remix public tracks through the Explore hub, split any song into stems, and edit or replace parts of a track without regenerating the whole song.

The Music Inpainting API supports lyric edits, section replacements, looping, and style changes, while improved lyric generation gives clearer vocals that match song tone.

• Qwen Code v0.6.0 added experimental Skills, improved VS Code support, new /compress and /summary commands, and multi-provider authentication.

• Manus released Design View, letting users visually mark where its AI agents should edit or act.

• Tella upgraded Chapters with faster performance, auto chapter creation, clipable segments, and full editor access.

• Higgsfield AI added support for Seedance 1.5 Pro for higher-quality video generations.

• Firecrawl added /agent support, enabling AI agents to search, navigate, and return structured web data inside apps like ChatGPT and Claude.

• Z AI is preparing an IPO on January 8 to raise $560 million as the company behind the GLM model family.

• Cap 0.4.0 launches January 1 with Screenshot Mode, auto captions, new editor tracks, improved recording recovery, and faster performance.

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See you on the next one!

That’s all for this edition. Hopefully you found something new to spark ideas and make your workflow smoother.

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