AGI is whatever you want it to be

On a press call this week, OpenAI president Greg Brockman did something unusual: he told reporters that the company’s new model, Astra, marks the beginning of the AGI era. “For me personally, I do think we’re there,” he said, before adding that he would leave it up to “the reader to decide for themselves.” The announcement came alongside a major enterprise push, a delayed release tied to a recent security incident, and a brewing controversy over whether the model can hide its own reasoning. Meanwhile, Apple is preparing for its first major product event under new CEO John Ternus, and Nvidia is acquiring Hugging Face in a move that reshapes the open-model landscape. The Vergecast’s news roundup covers all three developments, plus a lightning round of gadgets from IFA in Berlin.

OpenAI declares the AGI era — with caveats

Astra, the model OpenAI unveiled this week, is being described internally as a “generational leap” in capability, particularly for cybersecurity, software engineering, science, and computer and browser use. On the press call, executives emphasized that the model is no longer “embarrassing” to watch perform tasks — it can draft legal briefs, create design mockups, and navigate browsers in ways that earlier models could not. The demo video showed knowledge workers across fields using Astra via chat and voice mode.