- Horizon AI
- Posts
- OpenAI Comes for Hollywood with New AI-Animated Film 🎬
OpenAI Comes for Hollywood with New AI-Animated Film 🎬
How to set Google AI Mode as the default on Chrome
Gina Acosta
September 08, 2025
In partnership with
Welcome to another edition of Horizon AI,
OpenAI is putting its resources into the creation of a mostly AI-generated animated film, aiming to show how AI could transform the film industry by reducing production time and costs.
Let’s jump into it!
Read Time: 4.5 min
Here's what's new today in the Horizon AI
OpenAI Backs AI-Made Animated Feature Film
Anthropic to Pay $1.5B to Authors in Landmark AI Settlement
AI Tutorial: How to set Google AI Mode as the default on Chrome
AI Tools to check out
AI Findings/Resources
Meme of the Day
The Latest in AI and Tech 💡
AI News
OPENAI
OpenAI Backs AI-Made Animated Feature Film
OpenAI is lending its tools and computing resources to support the creation of a feature-length animated movie made largely with AI, which is expected to be released in theaters globally next year.
Details:
The film, called Critterz, is the brainchild of Chad Nelson, a creative specialist at OpenAI.
He is currently working with production companies in London and Los Angeles, aiming to debut a feature-length version of the film at the Cannes Film Festival in May.
The team is attempting to complete the movie in about nine months instead of the three years it would typically take, with a budget of under $30 million, far less than animated films typically cost.
It won’t be fully AI, though. Human actors will be cast for character voices, and artists will be hired to draw sketches that will be fed into OpenAI’s tools, including GPT-5 and its image-generating models.
The human element is also important for the film to qualify for copyright protection, since AI-generated work alone cannot be copyrighted.
The studios involved are developing a compensation model so the roughly 30 people working on Critterz can share in any profits.
Companies like Disney and Netflix are already experimenting with AI tools for production, user experience, and marketing. OpenAI hopes that if Critterz is successful, it will show that AI can create content good enough for the big screen, speed up Hollywood’s adoption of the technology, and lower the cost of entry, allowing more people to produce creative work.
TOGETHER WITH LEVANTA
Top Publishers Hand-Selecting Amazon Brands to Promote this Holiday Season
This holiday season, top publishers are handpicking Amazon brands to feature in gift guides, newsletters, and reviews — driving high-intent shoppers straight to storefronts.
Levanta is connecting a select group of 7–9 figure brands with publishers ready to promote products to millions of buyers.
ANTHROPIC
Anthropic to Pay $1.5B to Authors in Landmark AI Settlement
Anthropic has agreed to pay at least $1.5 billion to authors to settle a class-action lawsuit over the use of books in training its AI models, the largest publicly reported settlement in a US copyright case paying about $3,000 per book.
Details:
The deal still needs court approval, with a hearing set for September 8.
The settlement only covers past acts. It does not provide a license for future AI training and does not release any claims that arise after August 25, 2025, keeping the door open for future legal action if issues continue.
As part of the terms, Anthropic must delete the original files it downloaded and any copies. This adds a data-cleanup requirement on top of the monetary payout.
The case grew from claims that Anthropic used pirated books. A judge previously said training on legally purchased books can be fair use, but left the claims about pirated books for trial, which raised the stakes for a class action.
Authors and rightsholders can visit AnthropicCopyrightSettlement.com for updates and to provide contact info; a searchable list of covered works is expected if the court gives preliminary approval.
This comes as AI companies face more copyright suits while also making data-licensing deals with publishers, platforms, and media. Anthropic still faces other legal cases, including a Reddit lawsuit over bot access and a 2023 case from Universal Music over lyrics.
AI Tutorial
How to set Google AI Mode as the default on Chrome
Google’s AI Mode can be a great productivity boost if you want to search faster and smarter. It gives you instant answers, multimodal search, follow-up questions, and access to sources—all directly in Chrome.
Open Chrome and type this in the address bar: chrome://settings/searchEngines
Under Site search, click Add.
Fill in the details:
Name: AI Mode
Shortcut: ai
URL: https://www.google.com/search?udm=50&q=%s
After adding it, click the three dots next to it and select Make default.
Done—you’re now using Google AI Mode as your main search in Chrome.
The steps are similar in other browsers like Microsoft Edge, Brave, etc.
AI Tools to check out
🗣 Ztalk: Break language barriers in video calls with AI-powered real-time translation.
👨💻 Daytona: Secure and elastic infrastructure for running your AI-generated code.
⏳ Base44: Turn your ideas into products, in minutes.
💻 ComputerX: Your smart assistant that gets computer work done for you—let AI operate your desktop to research, visualize, and automate.
💥 Slashy: It connects to all your tools to complete entire tasks.
AI Findings/Resources
🔍 Be careful trusting content online with tools like Nano Banana on the rise
😱 A mom uses AI to make her kids' messes look like they're on the news
🌐 Impact of chatbots on mental health is warning over future of AI, expert says
👀 ChatGPT prompted to "create the exact replica of this image, don't change a thing" 74 times
TOGETHER WITH PACASO
Keep This Stock Ticker on Your Watchlist
They’re a private company, but Pacaso just reserved the Nasdaq ticker “$PCSO.”
No surprise the same firms that backed Uber, eBay, and Venmo already invested in Pacaso. What is unique is Pacaso is giving the same opportunity to everyday investors. And 10,000+ people have already joined them.
Created a former Zillow exec who sold his first venture for $120M, Pacaso brings co-ownership to the $1.3T vacation home industry.
They’ve generated $1B+ worth of luxury home transactions across 2,000+ owners. That’s good for more than $110M in gross profit since inception, including 41% YoY growth last year alone.
And you can join them today for just $2.90/share. But don’t wait too long. Invest in Pacaso before the opportunity ends September 18.
Paid advertisement for Pacaso’s Regulation A offering. Read the offering circular at invest.pacaso.com. Reserving a ticker symbol is not a guarantee that the company will go public. Listing on the NASDAQ is subject to approvals.
Meme of the Day
The latest in AI and Tech
Free users get five prompts per day with Gemini 2.5 Pro, while AI Pro subscribers receive 100 and AI Ultra subscribers 500. Free accounts are also capped at five Deep Research reports and 100 image generations daily, compared to 1,000 images for paid tiers.
This AI-powered feature delivers personalized playlists every Monday. It is available across all subscription tiers in the U.S. within the app on both iOS and Android, and the playlists refresh based on each user’s recent listening habits and evolving musical moods.
The startup has formally endorsed SB 53, a California bill that would require major AI developers to adopt safety frameworks and publish risk reports before deploying powerful models.
The bill has cleared the state Senate but still awaits a final vote before reaching Governor Gavin Newsom.
The AI companion app, designed to act as a friend and confidante, will shut down on October 5.
The founders, Sam Whitmore and former Apple designer Jason Yuan, said they chose to close the app after diverging on their vision for its future.
The kids-safety-focused nonprofit highlighted risks of inappropriate content, unsafe advice, and insufficient guidance tailored to younger users’ developmental needs.
The organization calls for versions "designed with their needs and development in mind, not just a modified version of a product built for adults."
That’s a wrap!
We'd love to hear your thoughts on today's email!Your feedback helps us improve our content |
Not subscribed yet? Sign up here and send it to a colleague or friend!
See you in our next edition!
Gina 👩🏻💻