Hey Reader,

Welcome back!

We're one month away from the end of summer, and it looks like the "summer slowdown for AI" just isn't happening this year.

This week gave us several tasty news stories, including Sam Altman releasing juicy details on the direction of OpenAI and a mysterious new AI image editing model called "nano-banana" coming out of nowhere to blow the competition away.

We'll break down those news stories below, plus share with you a free image editing AI you can actually use today, give you a prompt that will help you find your next favorite hobby, and more.

Let's get right into it...

🪄 App of the Week: Qwen-Image-Edit

Use Case: Edit Images with Natural Language

Link: Qwen (Free, Not Sponsored!)​

Why you should care:
​Alibaba's Qwen team just released a new AI model that is extraordinarily good at image editing, and anybody can use it for free right now.

Qwen-Image-Edit is a 20B parameter, open-source image editing model that supports both low-level visual appearance editing (like adding, removing, or modifying specific elements) and high-level visual semantic editing (like style transfer or IP creation.)

But where Qwen-Image-Edit really shines is in editing text in images: it supports both English and Chinese text editing and allows addition, deletion, or modification of text without altering the original font, size, or style. (Unless you ask it to!)

Here's how to use Qwen-Image-Edit for free right now:

1. Go to the link above to access the Qwen platform.
2. Sign in or create an account.
3. Upload an image by clicking the plus button under the chat box.
4. Select "Image Edit" option below the chat box.
5. Type a prompt that describes the edit you want made.
6. Send the prompt!

After a few seconds, Qwen will output an edited image. If you're unhappy with the result, explain why in the chatbox to iterate on that edit, or try again with a slightly different prompt. Once you're done, you can download your image for your own purposes.

📰 News That Matters: Sam Altman Reveals OpenAI's Lofty Ambitions

Link: I talked to Sam Altman about the GPT-5 launch fiasco | The Verge​

Why it matters:
​OpenAI’s much-hyped GPT-5 has finally arrived, but unlike GPT-4, it didn’t leave the competition in the dust. Performance-wise, GPT-5 lands in the same ballpark as models from xAI, Google, and Anthropic.

If all the top models are hitting similar benchmarks, the next phase of the AI race won’t be won by fighting to create the smartest model. It’ll be won by whoever can build the most useful platforms and systems around those models.

At least, that's what Sam Altman is betting on.

At the end of last week, Altman sat down with reporters in San Francisco to discuss the future of OpenAI, and he painted a clear picture of the company's eagerness to move beyond creating AI models like GPT-5.

Here’s what Altman said is coming next for OpenAI:

• Consumer apps: Former Instacart CEO Fidji Simo is joining to oversee a new wave of products beyond ChatGPT. That could include an AI-powered browser to rival Chrome and even a fresh take on social media powered by AI.
• Hardware: Altman teased the forthcoming device he’s building with Jony Ive, promising it’ll be so beautiful that “if you put a case over it, I will personally hunt you down.”
• Brain-computer interfaces: OpenAI is exploring a potential investment in Merge Labs, a Neuralink competitor, hinting at deeper ambitions around human-AI integration.
• Enterprise & infrastructure: From data centers to robotics to energy, OpenAI is setting its sights on a much broader landscape, aiming to operate more like Alphabet than an AI research lab.

One surprising revelation from the dinner is that while GPT-5 wasn’t the revolution some hoped for, adoption is already off the charts. API traffic doubled within 48 hours of launch, and OpenAI says it’s effectively “out of GPUs” from the surge in demand.

So make no mistake: OpenAI will continue to compete to create the world's best AI.

But Altman has made it clear that OpenAI's ambitions do not end there. He's already investing heavily in the post-ChatGPT era, where OpenAI's success may depend less on its next model and more on the ecosystem it builds around it.

📝 Prompt of the Week: Find Your Next Passion

Prompt Formula:
​I want five fresh activities/hobbies/projects that recreate the ingredients I love in my current favorites. Act as a pattern-spotting coach. My current activities & what I love about them:
[ACTIVITY #1] — I love: [QUALITIES/FEELINGS/SKILLS]
[ACTIVITY #2] — I love: [QUALITIES/FEELINGS/SKILLS]
[ACTIVITY #3] — I love: [QUALITIES/FEELINGS/SKILLS]
Your tasks:
- Extract & cluster: Identify the underlying components I love (e.g., competitive, technical, freedom, social). Group them into 3–5 themes and rank them by importance based on repetition/emphasis.
- Recommend (exactly 5): Propose five distinct ideas across varied domains (avoid near-duplicates of my current activities). Among the five, include one “stretch” idea (a bit ambitious) and one “micro” idea (can try in <30 minutes). For each idea, provide a name, why it fits (map top themes → features), time & cost (low/med/high), solo/social options, “First-weekend plan”: 3 concrete steps to try it, and a minimal starter kit or resources (no links; just what to search for)
Additional notes:
- Aim for novelty and variety (sports, making, arts, community, learning, outdoor, digital).
- Keep recommendations beginner-friendly but exciting.
- Don’t recommend the same activity I already do or obvious clones.

Quick Description:
​This prompt is designed to reverse-engineer what you actually enjoy about your current hobbies and use that as a blueprint to recommend five new activities you may want to try next.

How to Use:

1. Copy the above prompt.
2. Paste into ChatGPT. (Or your favorite LLM, as this prompt works with any chatbot!)
3. Replace [ACTIVITY #1] with one of your favorite current activities.
4. Replace [QUALITIES/FEELINGS/SKILLS] with keywords or brief explanations of why you love doing this activity.
5. Repeat for [ACTIVITY #2] and [ACTIVITY #3]
6. Send the prompt!

ChatGPT will give you a list of new activities to explore, along with explanations of why it thinks you would enjoy them and recommended steps for you to get started.

Feel free to add more than 3 activities for ChatGPT to analyze, or switch up which hobbies you input to get a fresh list of new activities to explore.

Go use this prompt to find your new passion!

📽️ Video of the Week: nano-banana is Breathtaking & im deleting Photoshop.

​

There's a new mysterious AI model making waves online. It's called "nano-banana", and it's turning heads because it's incredibly effective at image editing.

There's a reason people are calling for the death of Photoshop after seeing this model perform. Word on the street is that this is Google's next image AI model, but those rumors are still unconfirmed.

​Check out this video from MattVidPro to get more details on nano-banana and see it in action!

📢 Community Highlight: Empowering Your Workforce with AI

This week, The AI Advantage Community got to learn from AI Educator and Readiness Consultant Jennifer Lee Hufnagel in an interactive live lecture called “Empowering Your Workforce: Building AI Awareness, Readiness, and Adoption.”​

In Jennifer's session, she helped community members understand how their organizations can unlock the real value of AI. (Hint: the key is people, not tech.)

Here’s a taste of what she shared:

• AI is urgent and a huge opportunity: We're in an AI revolution as big as the dawn of the internet. Early adopters are positioned to win.
• Put people first: AI success depends on culture, not just tools. That means upskilling teams, fostering experimentation, and building trust.
• Follow a structured journey: Jennifer broke it down into three stages: Awareness, Readiness, and Adoption.
• Govern wisely: Clear policies around privacy and human oversight are essential to safe, effective AI use.

This event was exactly the kind of thing we love hosting for our members.

Want in on events like this? Click here to learn more about The AI Advantage community and join today!​

That's all for this week!

See you next Thursday.

Much Love,
Igor & The AI Advantage Team

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Written By:​
​Igor Pogany - igor@myaiadvantage.com​
​Daniel Pierce - danielpierce305@gmail.com​
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