AI in practice Archive

Feb 16, 2026

Manus launches its AI agent on Telegram, letting users run complex tasks directly in chat. Telegram is the first supported platform, with more on the way. Users connect via QR code, and it's available to everyone regardless of subscription tier.

Manus Agents brings the full web version's capabilities to chat, according to Manus: multi-step tasks, research, data processing, and document creation. Users can send voice messages, images, and files, and choose between two models: Manus 1.6 Max for complex tasks and Manus 1.6 Lite for quick queries. Manus says the agent can't access other Telegram chats. More details are on the Manus website.

The Telegram-first launch is notable given that Meta acquired the startup in late 2025. The deal is still under review by Chinese authorities, which could explain the choice. It's also possible that Meta wants Manus to test the feature somewhere not tied to its brand in case things go sideways. Agent technology remains fragile, especially around cybersecurity—something the hyped AI agent software OpenClawd recently showed the hard way.

Comment Source: Manus

Matthias Bastian

Feb 16, 2026

AI in practice

Peter Steinberger, the developer behind the open-source project OpenClaw, is joining OpenAI. His focus will be on building the next generation of personal AI agents. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman called Steinberger a "genius with a lot of amazing ideas about the future of very smart agents interacting with each other to do very useful things for people." Altman expects this work to quickly become a core part of OpenAI's product lineup.

OpenClaw, Steinberger's original hobby project, which blew up over the past few weeks, will "live in a foundation as an open-source project" and will be supported by OpenAI, Altman says, calling the future "extremely multi-agent."

Steinberger writes in his blog that he spoke to several large AI labs in San Francisco but ultimately chose OpenAI because they shared the same vision. Steinberger's goal: building an agent that even his mother can use. Getting there, he says, requires fundamental changes, more security research, and access to the latest models.

What I want is to change the world, not build a large company and teaming up with OpenAI is the fastest way to bring this to everyone.
Peter Steinberger

Comment Source: Steinberger Blog | Altman via X

Jonathan Kemper

Feb 15, 2026

AI in practice

Mastra's open source AI memory uses traffic light emojis for more efficient compression

Colorful chat bubbles next to grey stacks of cards with red-yellow-green traffic light emojis.

Maximilian Schreiner

Feb 15, 2026

Update

AI in practice

Anthropic still won't give the Pentagon unrestricted access to its AI models

The Pentagon wants unrestricted access to AI technology. Anthropic is demanding guarantees against autonomous weapons control and domestic surveillance. A $200 million contract hangs in the balance.

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Matthias Bastian

Feb 15, 2026

AI in practice

Bytedance's Seedance 2.0 is so good at copying Disney characters the company calls it a "virtual smash-and-grab"

Bytedance’s Seedance 2.0 can generate Disney characters, replicate actors’ voices, and recreate entire fictional worlds with stunning realism. Hollywood is fighting back with cease-and-desist letters and calls for legal actio, but the case highlights a growing problem: copyright law was built for a world where copying took effort.

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Matthias Bastian

Feb 14, 2026

AI in practice

Bytedance's Seed2.0 adds even more price pressure on Western AI models

Bytedance has released its new Seed2.0 AI model series. The story is a familiar one by now: the models match Western AI models on benchmarks while costing a fraction of the price.

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Matthias Bastian

Feb 14, 2026

Short News

Google and OpenAI are complaining about data theft—yes, you read that right. According to Google, Gemini was hit with a massive cloning attempt through distillation, with a single campaign firing over 100,000 requests at the model, NBC News reports. Google calls it intellectual property theft, pointing to companies and researchers chasing a competitive edge.

Meanwhile, OpenAI has sent a memo to the US Congress accusing DeepSeek of using disguised methods to copy American AI models. The memo also flags China's energy buildout, ten times the new electricity capacity the US added by 2025, and confirms ChatGPT is growing at around ten percent per month.

Distillation floods a model with targeted prompts to extract its internal logic, especially its "reasoning steps," then uses that knowledge to build a cheaper clone, potentially skipping billions in training costs. Google security head John Hultquist warns smaller companies running their own AI models face the same risk, particularly if those models were trained on sensitive business data.

Comment Source: NBC News | OpenAI

Matthias Bastian

Feb 14, 2026

AI in practice

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei suggests OpenAI doesn't "really understand the risks they're taking"

Anthropic’s revenue has grown 10x year over year, and CEO Dario Amodei believes Nobel Prize-level AI is maybe just a year or two away. So why isn’t he going all in on compute? Because being off by even one year could mean bankruptcy, and he’s not sure his competitors have done the math.

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Matthias Bastian

Feb 13, 2026

AI in practice

MiniMax M2.5 promises "intelligence too cheap to meter" as Chinese labs squeeze Western AI pricing

Matthias Bastian

Feb 13, 2026

AI in practice

Google's WebMCP moves the web closer to becoming a structured database for AI agents

In the future, AI agents won’t just search the web; they’ll browse it, shop on it, and complete tasks on their own. At least that’s Big AI’s vision, and Google’s WebMCP wants to turn websites into standardized interfaces for these agents. For website operators who depend on human visitors, that could be a serious problem.

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