Read Online | Sign Up | Advertise | | | Good morning, AI enthusiasts. A few months ago, Anthropic was one of the Pentagon's most prominent AI partners. Now it's suing the government in federal court. | With two new lawsuits challenging the "supply chain risk" label and White House directive to cut ties, Anthropic is arguing it's being retaliated against for speaking up on safety — and now 30+ employees from OpenAI and Google are lining up behind them. | | In today's AI rundown: | Anthropic takes U.S. government to court Microsoft's Claude-powered Copilot Cowork Auto-generate videos from content with Manus a16z releases new consumer AI Top 100 4 new AI tools, community workflows, and more
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| | | | ANTHROPIC | |  | Image source: Lovart / The Rundown |
| The Rundown: Anthropic fired back at the Trump administration with two lawsuits, challenging the Pentagon's 'supply chain risk' label and White House directive for all federal agencies to drop Claude — a move it calls punishment for its AI safety positions. | The details: | Anthropic filed lawsuits in two separate courts, asking judges to throw out the blacklist label and block the government from forcing agencies to cut ties. The suits argue the 'supply chain risk' label was designed to counter foreign adversary threats, not punish a U.S company over policy disagreements. They also claim the Pentagon violated free speech rights by retaliating for publicly advocating AI safety limits on weapons and surveillance. 30+ OAI and Google staffers signed a legal brief backing Anthropic's Pentagon lawsuit, warning that the blacklisting threatens U.S. AI leadership.
| Why it matters: Whatever side you take on who controls AI in warfare, the federal response (Hegseth's blacklist, Trump's Truth Social posts) has looked a lot like retaliation. Win or lose, the case could decide whether the gov. can move against a domestic company for speaking up on safety — a precedent all labs will be watching. |
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| | TOGETHER WITH TELEPORT | | | The Rundown: Autonomous agents can't rely on API keys or long-lived credentials anymore. Teleport's Agentic Identity Framework replaces static secrets with verifiable, cryptographic identity for machine actors at scale. | With Teleport, you get: | Zero standing privileges for autonomous agents Ephemeral, certified machine identities Policy-based access control Reliable, auditable workflow orchestration
| If agents can act, they must be identified. Explore the framework. |
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| | MICROSOFT | |  | Image source: Microsoft |
| The Rundown: Microsoft just introduced Copilot Cowork, a new M365 feature built on Anthropic's Claude system that runs tasks in the background across apps — launching alongside a $99 enterprise bundle and a new platform for governing AI agents at scale. | The details: | Cowork operates in the cloud, pulling from emails, meetings, files, and chats across M365 — a contrast to Claude Cowork's current desktop-only approach. Microsoft built Cowork directly with Anthropic, using Claude Cowork's tech but wrapped in M365's enterprise security and compliance layers. Users describe an outcome, and Cowork breaks it into steps, producing deliverables like decks, briefing docs, and workbooks across apps. Cowork is available in a limited research preview, coming with a new $99/user E7 tier that bundles Copilot with agent management and security tools.
| Why it matters: If you can't beat the thing that scared your investors, absorb it. Embedding Anthropic's agent tech inside M365's security boundaries gives Copilot Cowork something Claude Cowork can't easily match (yet) — deep, integrated enterprise context across 450M users' worth of emails, calendars, and files. |
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| | AI TRAINING | | | The Rundown: In this guide, you will learn how to use Manus to script, generate, and assemble a short promotional video from any written content you already have — with no video editing experience required. | Step-by-step: | Start with a blog post, a press release, or even a news story. Download it as a PDF or Markdown file, and log in to Manus.im Create a project with instructions: "You are a video producer for [my brand]. Your job is to transform written content into branded videos" In the project task, click the plus button > Use Skills > video-generator, and prompt: "Create a 15–20 second teaser video based on the attached post. The CTA is to read the full blog. Generate it in portrait orientation for Instagram Reels. Give me four script options before you generate. Use default mode" Carefully review Manus's script options and pick the best one. Video generation should take 5–10 minutes and use between 499–800 credits
| Pro tip: Save tokens by uploading B-roll videos and music into a Google Drive folder and connecting it to Manus. |
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| | PRESENTED BY GALILEO | | | The Rundown: RAG isn't dead, it's evolved: from basic vector search to today's agentic architectures with self-correction and adaptive retrieval. | Read Galileo's new 240+ page guide to learn how to build RAG systems that work in 2026, including: | Mastering chunking, embedding, and reranking strategies Building evaluation frameworks using retrieval and generation metrics Implementing advanced patterns like query decomposition and adaptive retrieval
| Get the free eBook. |
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| | AI RESEARCH | |  | Image source: a16z |
| The Rundown: a16z released the sixth edition of consumer AI Top 100, expanding the list to include traditional apps with AI like Canva and CapCut for the first time, along with data showing ChatGPT still dominates overall usage, but rivals are gaining ground. | The details: | ChatGPT crossed 900M weekly users and still dwarfs every rival, but the gap is tightening — with Claude and Gemini growing paid subs over 200% last year. The new list included "AI-enhanced" consumer apps for the first time, with CapCut, Canva, Notion, Grammarly, and others now slotting into the rankings. The report found three distinct AI ecosystems forming: Western, Chinese, and Russian, with sanctions accelerating the split as local alternatives fill the gaps. Agents are gaining ground, with Manus (#44) and (#47) Genspark making the cut, while OpenClaw is absent due to the report's time frame.
| Why it matters: a16z's consumer reports have become one of the best pulse checks on where AI adoption is actually heading, and this edition is no different. Given the recent OAI Pentagon drama, cancellations, and Claude surge, the battlefield for consumers' 'default AI' could be even more competitive in the next release. |
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| | | | | 🔒 Incogni - Remove your personal data from the web so scammers and identity thieves can't access it. Use code RUNDOWN to get 55% off* 🤖 Copilot Cowork - Microsoft's Anthropic-powered AI for M365 tasks 🧠 GPT-5.4 - OpenAI's flagship reasoner with native computer use, 1M context 🗂️ Claude Marketplace - Anthropic's hub for Claude-powered partner tools
| *Sponsored Listing |
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| | | Anthropic rolled out Code Review for Claude Code in Team and Enterprise accounts, which uses teams of AI agents to deep-read code and flag bugs.
OpenAI announced the acquisition of Promptfoo, an AI security and red-teaming platform, to embed native agent testing into its Frontier enterprise platform. | Andrew Ng released Context Hub, a free tool that gives AI coding agents access to current documentation to prevent them from using outdated or hallucinated code. | OpenAI is further delaying its "adult mode" feature for ChatGPT, shelving the verified-users-only option to focus on intelligence, personality, and proactive capabilities. | Anthropic launched Claude Marketplace in limited preview, letting enterprises apply existing spend commitments toward partner tools from GitLab, Harvey, and others. |
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| | | | | Every newsletter, we showcase how a reader is using AI to work smarter, save time, or make life easier. | Today's workflow comes from reader Tina J. in Farmingdale, NY: | "I'm working towards a promotion at the end of the year and used Copilot to evaluate my resume against real work artifacts and a competency framework. Copilot analyzed my work output and identified where I was already operating at the next level and where I could strengthen my visibility and framing. | Then I asked it to generate promotion-aligned custom instructions to reinforce strategic, executive-level behavior in future work." | How do you use AI? Tell us here. |
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| | | | That's it for today!Before you go we'd love to know what you thought of today's newsletter to help us improve The Rundown experience for you. | | See you soon, | Rowan, Joey, Zach, Shubham, and Jennifer — the humans behind The Rundown | |
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