Howdy wizards,
Today’s issue is brought to you by the awesome Context.dev, who turn any web page into structured context for your AI agents.
Before diving into the new amazing models that just dropped, I have a little story and a question for you:
For about a year now, I’ve been running multiple Claude Code threads in parallel, every time I’m online. And for a while, the context switching started to feel like pure chaos. Lotta agents to keep track of, y’know?
In the last two months I’ve done spring cleaning. Every area of my life has its own workspace. Its own context layer, access permissions and workflows. I’ve also built a visual identity for each area (across terminals, browser windows, calendars, ++) so my brain understands which project I’m in quickly.
Can’t recommend this enough. My agents have cleaner data. And I have more peace and cognitive bandwidth.
Most of what we do on computers is about to run through agents, not fingers.
Build a lever for yourself now: spend time organising your work so agents can best help you.
I’ll be sharing more in-depth about my setup for juggling agents soon.
Meanwhile, I’m wondering about your experience: do you often work with multiple AIs/agents or chats at the same time? What do you struggle with?
The big thing
OpenAI released GPT-6 Astra.
OpenAI’s own charts put Astra meaningfully above every other model right now. Greg Brockman, its president, announced “the AGI era”.
But the independent index doesn’t agree: it scores Astra level with Sol and behind the new Claude (more on that in a bit).
The main thing people are talking about regarding this model is how much better and faster it is at computer work. About twice as fast as its predecessor, the Sol model.
Also, OpenAI calls this the most aligned model ever. You might remember the recent situation where OpenAI was doing a security evaluation and their agents went out and shamelessly hacked Hugging Face when they couldn’t solve an impossible task. They’ve tested Sol and Astra on similar tasks, and say that Sol misbehaves that way 48% of the time (yikes) but Astra is at 0%.
It’s rolling out on paid ChatGPT plans now, and it’s also available in the API (at 2.5x the price of Sol).
Why it matters
OpenAI calls it a step change in professional work.
And what’s that step change, exactly?
Using computers on our behalf, effectively.
We’re all starting to notice: most user interfaces are kinda just obstacles to getting work done.
I rarely click around in UIs anymore. Claude Code does it for me.
But it’s been a slow affair so far, and the promise of Astra is that it can do it both more accurately and faster.
AI for building software got its step change last December. The times we are in now feel similar, but for operating it.
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All the small things
Models
Anthropic released Claude Fable 5.1 two days before Astra. On independent benchmarks, it’s actually the better model of the two. And they cost the same per token through the API. So people will naturally be testing and comparing them over the next days and weeks. I’m planning to quietly keep using Claude and ignore Astra exists. I want you to know, it’s allowed.
New tools & product features
Runway’s Solaris is a so-called Interface World Model that renders websites and apps as live video, without code underneath. It’s good for visual, throwaway things (showrooms, science demos, tutorials), not for software that has to store your data or behave the same way twice. The interface only exists while you’re looking at it.
OpenClaw 2.0 is out, and it no longer takes an afternoon to set up. You can now set it up with your ChatGPT or Claude subscription you already pay for; it used to demand three separate API keys.
Industry moves
Nvidia confirmed it: it’s buying Hugging Face for $12.93B. Jensen Huang says the platform stays open to every cloud and chip, and Nvidia hardware won’t be required to use it.
OpenAI is pulling its models out of Cursor on November 12, because SpaceX bought it. The beef between Sam Altman and Elon Musk is a neverending story.
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You are a delight.
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