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Welcome Automaters, 👋
So Data Centers have officially hit peak villain era. Local communities are tired of them, environmentalists are eyeing them, and the public vibe is, frankly, super cold.
So what is OpenAI’s genius solution to this massive PR headache? Rebrand them.
According to a fresh report from Axios, OpenAI is quietly plotting a massive "PR blitz" slated to drop right after the midterm elections. With Democrats poised to snatch back the House (and potentially the Senate), OpenAI isn't waiting around to see how the political chips fall. They’re getting ahead of the story.
Here’s the inside scoop on what OpenAI’s chief global affairs officer, Chris Lehane, is cookin' up:
The 2028 Prophecy: Lehane called these midterms a mere "movie trailer" for the 2028 presidential election, predicting that AI will be the central issue on the ballot.
The Rebrand of the Century: Instead of ugly, energy-chugging "data centers," OpenAI wants you to start calling them "AI compute campuses." (Because everything sounds nicer if it sounds like higher education, right?)
AI Speed Limits: Yes, you read that right. OpenAI is actually floating the idea of regulatory "speed limits" for AI deployment.
Global Rules of the Road: They’re pushing hard for the U.S. to step up and dictate global AI standards before other nations take the wheel.
Empowerment Over Automation: A huge chunk of this campaign will focus on convincing everyday folks that AI is here to upgrade their lives, not steal their jobs.
Now, let's talk about the elephant in the room: data centers are so controversial right now that tech titans like Amazon and Microsoft had to publicly pledge to stop slapping NDAs on local government deals.
Surprisingly, Lehane isn't running away from the drama. He called the intense public backlash "good and healthy." According to him: "Communities should hold companies responsible and accountable so they really and truly get a transformative benefit from these projects."
Translating from corporate-speak: Tech giants know the honeymoon phase is officially over. Now, it’s a race to see who can spin their massive infrastructure projects into community wins before the 2028 election circus fully kicks off.
What do you think??
Here's what we have for you today
😳 How AI Code Generation is Upending Traditional Software
Vibe coding has officially taken a wildly chaotic turn.
Earlier this month, a developer fueled by a burning, righteous hatred for Adobe's notoriously brutal subscription model used Claude to reverse-engineer Photoshop, Lightroom, and the rest of the Creative Cloud squad. From there, the team built open-source clones that anyone can download, tweak, and use completely for free.
In fact, more and more coders are creating their own apps through reverse engineering and even adding features to existing ones.
And just like that, the internet is at absolute war.
Team "Get Wrecked, Adobe": is convinced that abusive subscription app makers are finally getting the karmic justice they deserve.
Team "That’s Just Piracy": is shouting from the rooftops about copyright infringement, trademark violations, and the wild west of AI-driven code.
Somewhere in the middle, the rapid-fire spread of AI is opening up a massive, messy can of worms regarding patents, copyright laws, and intellectual property. Let's spill the tea.
Meet Artcraft: The Photoshop Killer?
Free alternatives like GIMP or Darktable have existed for decades. But let’s be real: most of us are too lazy to relearn entire user interfaces after years of building pure muscle memory in Adobe's ecosystem.
Then enter software developer Brandon Thomas and his crew. They launched Artcraft, and other Adobe suite clones in early October with a pitch that sounds too good to be true: a one-to-one Creative Cloud replacement with a familiar UI, zero subscriptions, and complete ownership of the source code.
Why did Thomas do it? As he confessed on Hacker News, he got "bit by [Adobe's]... dark pattern 'cancellation fee' one too many times." Using Claude Opus 5.5, he built a "clean room... pure Rust" versions that he claims run circles around the original apps.
The Test Drive Verdict: Sure, it lacks AI and other heavy-duty power features. But for basic resizing, masking, and color tweaking? It does the job. Best of all, the menus are so close to Photoshop that you wouldn't need a tutorial!
The Catch:
Critical bugs are floating around (some users reported lost images and wild layer-merging).
It cannot open native PSD files. Which is a massive dealbreaker for heavy users.
Still, Thomas has grand ambitions. As he boldly put it, "Software is over... AI lets us take back tech and set the clock back to the pre-sh*y era."
But it gets even worse for Adobe and the rest.
Because right now, you don’t need to be a coding genius to join the party anymore. An open-source tool called REA (Reverse Engineer Anything) went viral recently, racking up tens of thousands of forks and stars on GitHub.
And true to its name, REA lets you deconstruct software and rebuild it in clean code without needing the original source files.
What it can do: Inspect apps, explain how features work, and build clean replicas.
Where it works: Smartphones, computers, and even firmware in smart devices like refrigerators, TVs, and musical instruments.
Even gaming history is getting rewritten. Human reverse-engineering communities are panicking because AI-driven decompilations of classic titles like Metroid Prime and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance are outpacing human coders. In fact, the human-led archival site decomp.dev recently announced it's shutting down because AI has completely overrun the space.
Of course, reactions from the community have been deliciously polarized.
But the real question is: Will it hold up in court? Even though the Artcraft team insists they never copied a single line of Adobe’s actual code, stepping on trademark and patent toes is a legal minefield. Plus, Adobe's terms of service explicitly ban reverse engineering.
That said, this trend has clearly opened Pandora's box. A single person skilled with AI can now potentially do what used to take a team of engineers. That will likely lead to countless terrible, slop-ridden apps, but it could also force companies like Adobe to rethink business models that many people despise.
But Wait... The Party Might Be Ending Early
Before you go uninstalling your Adobe subscription, pump the brakes. This wild west era might slam to a halt sooner than you think.
Anthropic has already started updating its models to actively refuse this kind of work, to be specific, they're blocking Claude from recreating video games, for starters. So yeah, It's only a matter of time before they, as well as other AI companies follow suit for apps, opening up a massive debate over who gets to use what, and for what purpose.
In short: We’re hurtling headfirst into a brand-new ethical battleground.
AI regulations have a long, long way to go, and let's be honest, the road ahead isn't going to be smooth. It’s going to be bumpy, chaotic, and we'll probably have to watch a few horrifying legal trainwrecks happen in real-time before anyone figures out the rules.
You can learn more here.
22 ChatGPT Agents Built for Every Marketing Job
Most marketers use ChatGPT to do general research and then call it an AI strategy. The ones outperforming them are deploying specialized agents built for specific jobs.
We put together 22 plug-and-play ChatGPT marketing agents that handle the work eating your week, each with built-in instructions and structured outputs ready to go in under 5 minutes.
Subscribe to Marketing Against the Grain and get all 22 free.
Inside you'll find:
Competitive intelligence agent that visits competitor websites and builds detailed comparison matrices automatically
Customer feedback analyzer that ranks improvement opportunities by business impact
Social listening specialist that monitors brand mentions and flags reputation risks before they escalate
Campaign optimization agents that handle attribution analysis and surface what is actually driving results
Your competitors are already running agents like these.
Get 22 ChatGPT Marketing Agents free when you subscribe to Marketing Against the Grain today.
🧱 Around The AI Block
⚠️ 5 safety practices to know before vibe coding.
😱 What happens when AI starts self-replicating?
😅 Sam Altman is upset at you for hoarding RAM in your own computer.
💰 OpenAI reportedly lowers funding target for new round.
🔒 Google joins OpenAI and Anthropic in promising new scraping controls.
💪 OpenAI adds stricter limits for teens asking about firearms.
👨⚖️ Judge says xAI must face NAACP lawsuit on data center pollution.
😳 Anthropic expected to receive high ‘junk’ rating from credit agencies following IPO.
✍️ Editor’s Corner
Dear Automaters
Hello and hope you had a good mid term. We certainly did with the kids and visited Guangzhou, the Chimelong zoo, and had wonderful food.
I just want to take a moment to step back and share some of the highlights we've made together:
Ethan and I have done more than 50 6 am livestreams over the last 2 or more months, resulting in 696 hours streamed, almost 5K views, and a whopping 73 hours of watch time!
From there, we've generated clips have gotten us more than 40k in views across all social media!
This community is also one for seriousness - this is the AI Sovereignty poll that we asked here and across all social media, and we had over 30 responses on this very tough and serious question. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1DPhjARpUv9jNS7jWqNWZlNV_6_r5wrvaAMGSN9V5zaE/edit?usp=sharing
These views and your participation would not be possible if you were not engaged and curious. So thank you very much, and thank you especially for warmly welcoming my son to the show.
Going forward, we'll make some tweaks:
Ethan and I will continue our livestreams, albeit a little more saner times. Right now we're about to start his first day of school so we have to see when his times are free
Instead of focusing on ALL news, we think the livestream is better suited for the most RELEVANT news. Now this will make the livestream shorter, but should be more impactful for you the listener.
We also will look to bring in more seriousness as well on here as well as the show. I am now being active on serious syndicated shows (RTHK in Hong Kong) as well as exploring academic institution collaborations, so if you're a fan, tune into our podcasts where you'll get a first look at all things! (Link here: https://www.theautomated.co/podcast/s/members_weekend_briefing/october_18_2026_ai_in_the_real_world_market_correction_and_china_s_ai_governance_push).
Thank you again for being a great member of the Automated community, and please do continue to share our FREE news and social media to as many people as possible!
🛠️ Trending Tools
For the Anime Artists: Maxsa AI is an AI creative studio tailored specifically for generating anime, manga, and cartoon illustrations from text prompts. It allows creators to produce original character art, convert static sketches into short animated clips, and lay out narrative scenes into full storyboards in seconds. It provides comic artists and animation enthusiasts with a dedicated pipeline for stylistic 2D media.
For the Solopreneurs & Startup Founders: StellarFirm deploys a coordinated team of specialized AI agents to handle cross-functional startup operations including software development, product management, marketing, and legal tasks. The agents collaborate autonomously to pass work between departments while maintaining a human-in-the-loop review gate before any code is published, funds are spent, or content is posted. It gives solo founders an AI-powered executive team to execute complex business workflows.
For the Video Editors & Content Creators: Video Swap Face swaps individual or multiple faces within videos, photos, and animated GIFs directly inside your browser. Users can crop specific sections of a clip before processing and apply distinct replacement faces to multiple subjects simultaneously. It gives creators and video editors a quick, privacy-friendly tool to swap facial identities in media clips without desktop software.
🤖 AI Workout Of The Day: How to Text and Get Your OpenAI Dot Agent to Text You Back (Without Regretting It)
When OpenAI dropped its Dot agents last month, the big promise was simple: eventually, you’d be able to text them like a real person.
Well, the wait is officially over. OpenAI is rolling out a preview feature for US Pro users that lets your Dot slide directly into your text threads. You can send it texts, photos, and voice memos, and Dot can even reach out to you first with real-time task updates.
Here’s how to get the whole feature configured in just a few taps.
Step 1: Prep Your Device: Before launching ChatGPT, check your phone’s default messaging settings:
iPhone Users: Confirm iMessage is toggled ON in your system settings.
Android Users: Make sure RCS messaging is active on your device.
Step 2: Enable Texting in ChatGPT
Open the ChatGPT app on your phone.
Navigate to your Dot’s profile page.
Select the Texting option to initiate the link.
OpenAI partnered with Linq to power the backend messaging infrastructure. According to the company's update on X, the integration underwent heavy penetration testing to lock down privacy:
In short: You're the only one who can text your dot, and your dot can only text you.
The Best Part: You enjoy cross-platform memory sync. Meaning, once connected, your Dot’s memory syncs automatically across platforms. Anything saved during a web or app conversation carries over into text messages seamlessly, keeping your context fully intact.
Warnings & Safety Tips:
Before handing your phone number over to an AI agent, keep these crucial boundaries in mind:
Watch out for accidental spam: Because Dot can proactively contact you with progress updates, set Custom Rules under ChatGPT's Personalization settings if you don't want unsolicited notifications blowing up your phone while you're off the clock.
Texting STOP works instantly: If your Dot gets a little too chatty or goes off the rails, you can pause SMS delivery immediately by texting STOP directly back in the thread.
Never text sensitive passwords or financial credentials: Even though Linq uses end-to-end encryption for transport, texts live in your carrier logs and device backups—keep sensitive authentication out of standard SMS/RCS threads.
Double-check connected app permissions: Since Dot shares context across web, and text, anything you allow Dot to access on the web can influence the context it brings into your workflow and text thread.
How Dot Stacks Up?
The personal AI agent space is heating up fast, especially with Anthropic launching Claude Duet. Here’s how the current lineup looks:
OpenAI Dot is currently exclusive to $200/month Pro users (Plus tier subscribers are locked out for now). It’s feature-complete with texting, image sharing, and voice memo capabilities, and a smoother, more polished workflow during early testing.
Anthropic Claude Duet is currently gated behind a US-only waitlist, it’s slated to hit the $20/month Pro plan at launch, and lacks direct phone texting capability at present.
💡 Prompts to Try:
-------------------Is this your AI Workout of the Week (WoW)? Cast your vote!
That's all we've got for you today.
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