Data Points | The Batch

In a library, a woman inspects an ancient manuscript using a magnifier and tech-assisted camera for detailed research.

Data Points

Google opens up its video-game world builder: DeepSeek’s OCR model parses pages like humans

OpenAI’s internal data analysis agent. SERA, open-weights coding models built for agents. Google’s gene prediction research in Nature. GPT-4o’s swan song.

Meteorological experts collaborate in tech lab to assess hurricane data, enhancing storm prediction and analysis.

Data Points

Moonshot lands a big one with Kimi K2.5: Qwen releases its own giant flagship reasoning model

OpenAI’s move to win over scientists and scholars. How U.S. workers are adopting (and not adopting) AI. Moltbot, an open-source local automation agent. Nvidia’s latest open weather and climate models.

Office environment with developers coding, featuring Pokemon for a playful tech workspace atmosphere.

Data Points

Anthropic updates Claude’s founding document: AI companies are obsessed with one video game

LFM2.5-1.2B-Thinking, a smartphone-sized reasoning model. Adobe’s initiative to win over the movie business. Google’s partnership with Japan’s biggest startup. AI companies’ relationship reset with U.S. government.

Teenagers having faces scanned by biometric security technology while using phones. Green grid lines shown.

Data Points

An AI system to identify teen ChatGPT users: GLM-4.7-Flash, a top 30B parameter model, is free to use

Persona drift: how prompts can enable bad behavior. X’s transformer-based personalization algorithm. How Cursor agents built a working web browser in a week. Expanding ChatGPT and model access for students.

Diverse group in park exchanging greetings in various languages, showcasing multicultural communication.

Data Points

OpenAI launches ChatGPT Go worldwide: Anthropic sees AI failure as an economic bottleneck

GLM-Image, an open-weights hybrid image model. TranslateGemma, Google’s fast translation model. Wikipedia’s new partnerships with AI companies. FLUX.2 [klein], a noncommercial image model for consumer hardware.

Nurses in blue scrubs using tablets in a hospital ICU, surrounded by medical equipment and patient monitors.

Data Points

Cowork, Claude Code’s non-coding cousin: Apple and Google’s new AI partnership

Anthropic’s play for the healthcare market. UCP, a new standard for agentic shopping. Malaysia and Indonesia’s stand against Grok. DeepSeek’s new memory management method.

Home workout setup with treadmill and screen displaying real-time fitness metrics, ideal for tracking exercise progress.

Data Points

China and Nvidia make a deal: OpenAI’s new health and wellness app

Universal and Nvidia’s music partnership. A new set of benchmarks for evaluating top models. Test-time learning, a method of training for long-context. Character.AI’s settlements in teen suicide cases.

A humanoid robot shakes hands with a businessman beside a robotic dog in an office setting with skyscraper view.

Data Points

Google and Boston Dynamics teams team up: Nvidia partners with Mercedes-Benz on autonomous cars

Qwen’s improved open-weights image editing model. Yann LeCun’s last research paper for Meta. Falcon H1R 7B, a hybrid reasoning model. SWE-Lego, a training recipe for squashing software bugs.

Scientists in lab coats work at computers analyzing molecular data in a modern laboratory with diverse team.

Data Points

Meta buys Manus for its agentic tech: Nvidia licenses Groq’s fast inference chips

GLM-4.7, Zhipu’s open-weights reasoning model. Minimax’s M2.1 update ahead of planned company IPO. India’s intervention to restrict Grok’s deepfake nudes. Scientific Context Protocol, a new standard for research agents.

Family and friendly robot celebrating New Year 2026 with dinner, toasting wine glasses, festive atmosphere.

Data Points

Readers’ highest hopes for AI in 2026, Part Two: A special New Year’s issue of Data Points

Usually, Data Points brings you the latest AI news, tools, models, and research in brief. But in today’s special New Year’s 2026 edition, you’ll find something different: a collection of our readers’ highest hopes for AI in 2026.

Urban street scene with diverse people walking, using smartphones, and a small robot, showcasing technology in daily life.

Data Points

Readers’ highest hopes for AI in 2026, Part One: A special New Year’s issue of Data Points

Usually, Data Points brings you the latest AI news, tools, models, and research in brief. But in today’s special New Year’s 2026 edition, you’ll find something different: a collection of our readers’ highest hopes for AI in 2026.

Medical office with robotic arms, doctor consulting patient, family observes.

Data Points

During Bay Area blackout, Waymo conks out: Meta’s Segment Anything family adds audio

GPT-5.2 Codex, OpenAI’s new agentic coding model. Qwen’s image layer segmentation model. A2UI, an open Google project to help agents build apps. Training robots to learn from human actions.