🚀 AI Goes Mainstream

From dinner bookings to billion-dollar platforms and sci-fi video calls, the future’s not coming—it’s here.

Author

JonasTheMachine
August 08, 2025

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This week’s AI news isn’t theory—it’s momentum.

Perplexity is taking a swing at Google in local search. OpenAI is running a $12 billion-a-year AI empire. And Character.Ai is making FaceTime calls feel like sci-fi.

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🧵 In today's edition:

  1. 🍽️ Perplexity Serves Up Instant Restaurant Booking

  2. 💰 OpenAI’s Revenue Engine Hits Overdrive

  3. 🗣️ Character.Ai Wants to FaceTime as Your Avatar

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1.🍽️ Perplexity Serves Up Instant Restaurant Booking

Perplexity isn’t just answering questions—it’s serving dinner plans.

They’ve partnered with OpenTable so you can search 60,000 restaurants and book a table without ever leaving the app. Just ask, pick, tap, and you’re confirmed.

With Google Maps still making you click through endless links, this could be Perplexity’s moment to own restaurant discovery.

This isn’t a side feature. It’s a shot at taking over local search.

2.💰 OpenAI’s Revenue Engine Hits Overdrive

OpenAI is pulling in $12 billion a year, with 700 million people using ChatGPT every week.

Even with $8 billion in projected spending for 2025, investor demand isn’t slowing down.

This isn’t early-stage growth. It’s a global AI platform running at full speed.

3.🗣️ Character.Ai Wants to FaceTime as Your Avatar

Character AI is testing something wild called TalkingMachines. It’s like FaceTime, but your call partner could be an anime hero, a photorealistic stranger, or a 3D creature—all moving, blinking, and talking with your voice in real time.

All you need is an image and some audio, and the AI does the rest. It’s not out as a full product yet, but the demos look straight out of sci-fi.

If AI avatars can chat this naturally, will you still want to hop on Zoom as yourself?

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JonasTheMachine