🚨 Anthropic bans Claude for xAI

Good Morning! Anthropic just cut off xAI’s access to its models inside Cursor, and the fallout is pushing competitors to go fully in-house. Plus, how to create high-end product animations with AI for free.

In today’s AI newsletter:

• How to Create High-End Product Animations With AI

• Anthropic Bans Claude For xAI

• AI’s Memorization Problem Explodes Into the Open

• Instagram Data Breach Exposes 17.5M Users

• 4 new AI tools worth trying

HOW TO AI

🗂️ How to Create High-End Product Animations With AI

In this tutorial, you’ll learn how to create cinematic, agency-level product animations using AI, without studios, cameras, or a budget. Brands spend thousands on visuals like these, but you can produce the same quality starting from a single image.

🧰 Who is This For

• Brand owners who want premium visuals without agency costs

• Marketers creating scroll-stopping ads and promos

• Creators launching new products or DTC brands

• Anyone who wants cinematic product videos fast

STEP 1: Generate a Studio-Quality Product Image

Everything starts with a clean, high-resolution product shot.

Open an advanced AI image generator (for example, Google Gemini with Nano Banana Pro enabled).

In the prompt box, describe your product and the environment clearly. Focus on lighting, materials, and mood.

Example Prompt:

“A vibrant red can of SF21 drink floating mid-air, surrounded by ice cubes and fresh lemon slices. Tropical atmosphere, warm cinematic lighting reflecting off the ice, soft sunset background, ultra-high detail, studio photography.”

Generate multiple images if needed and download the best one.

This becomes your hero product image, just like something shot in a professional studio.

STEP 2: Import the Image into the Animation Studio

Now it’s time to bring the image to life.

Go to:
https://labs.google/fx/tools/whisk/project

Once inside the interface, look at the left panel and find the SUBJECT section.
Click the plus (+) icon and upload the product image you created in Step 1.

Your product will now appear as the main subject ready for animation.

STEP 3: Describe the Cinematic Motion

This is where AI replaces complex keyframing.

At the bottom of the screen, you’ll see a large text input box.
Instead of animating manually, you simply describe how the scene should move.

Example Prompt:
“Create a dynamic cinematic animation. Slowly orbit around the can, highlighting the bold branding. Add subtle camera push-ins, soft water reflections below, floating ice movement, and shifting warm light. The scene should feel refreshing, energetic, and summer-inspired.”

The AI interprets this and animates the entire scene automatically.

STEP 4: Generate and Download the Final Video

Once your image and motion prompt are ready, click the Generate (yellow arrow) button.

The system will render the animation in a few moments.
When it’s done, you’ll see your once-static product transformed into a cinematic video with smooth motion, depth, and lighting effects.

AI NEWS

🚨 Anthropic Bans Claude For xAI

Anthropic has blocked its models from being used by xAI employees through Cursor, reportedly enforcing a new policy against major competitors.

• xAI teams were actively using Claude models for internal coding workflows

• Anthropic appears to be restricting access across competitors, not just xAI

• xAI leadership says this will hurt short-term productivity but accelerate internal model development

• xAI is now pushing staff toward Grok-based coding tools and models

This is AI’s “export controls” moment. As models become core productivity infrastructure, access is turning into leverage. The result? Every major lab is being forced to build its own full-stack tooling, models, agents, and developer workflows, or risk getting cut off overnight.

AI RESEARCH

📚 AI’s Memorization Problem Explodes Into the Open

New research from Stanford and Yale shows that major LLMs don’t just “learn patterns”, they can reproduce large chunks of copyrighted books verbatim, challenging the industry’s favorite metaphor.

• Models from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and xAI were shown to reconstruct entire books like Harry Potter and The Great Gatsby when prompted strategically

• Researchers describe LLMs as lossy compression systems, not learners — closer to MP3s or JPEGs than human minds

• This directly contradicts years of claims to regulators that models don’t store training data

• Courts may now face a new question: is an AI model itself an illegal copy of copyrighted works?

The “AI learns like humans” story is starting to collapse under evidence. If memorization is inherent, not a bug, then copyright lawsuits don’t just threaten fines, they threaten model takedowns and forced retraining. This isn’t an edge case. It’s an existential fault line for the entire generative AI industry.

DIGITAL SAFETY

🔐 Instagram Data Breach Exposes 17.5M Users

A reported Instagram data breach has allegedly exposed personal information of 17.5 million users, with the data now circulating on dark web marketplaces.

• Leaked data reportedly includes usernames, emails, phone numbers, and physical addresses

• Malwarebytes linked the leak to a possible Instagram API exposure from 2024

• Users reported multiple password reset emails, signaling attempted account access

• Stolen data could fuel phishing, SIM swaps, and account takeovers

Social platforms are becoming identity hubs, not just apps. When data at this scale leaks, the fallout isn’t just spam, it’s real financial and account risk. This is a reminder that platform security failures quickly become personal security problems, making 2FA and account audits non-optional in 2026.

Indonesia temporarily blocks Grok, citing the risk of non-consensual sexual deepfakes, becoming the first country to block the AI tool.

Morgan Stanley survey of audio habits in the US: 50% to 60% of listeners aged 18-44 reported listening to AI-generated music for 2.5 to 3 hours per week.

China releases draft guidelines for governing online personal data collection, open for public consultation amid privacy concerns and companies' data misuse.

Amazon rolled out a manager dashboard that tracks employees' office attendance and how many hours they spend there, after its RTO mandate.

📫 Gmail: Google’s email now powered by Gemini 3

🩺 ChatGPT Health: OpenAI’s new private health experience

🌌 Grok Imagine: xAI’s tool for generating images and videos

⚙️ Claude Code: Anthropic’s AI coding tool that understands deep context

THAT’S IT FOR TODAY

Thanks for making it to the end! I put my heart into every email I send, I hope you are enjoying it. Let me know your thoughts so I can make the next one even better!

See you tomorrow :)

- Dr. Alvaro Cintas