Agents, Distillation, AU Bills

By the Orchestra editors · 4 min read

TL;DR

OpenAI ships Agents API and full-duplex voice API for developers building cloud-based agents
Anthropic publishes report alleging systematic model distillation by Alibaba, Moonshot AI and DeepSeek
Australian social media bill passes with fines up to $99m for breaching youth ban
Metacognition, a new Aussie AI lab, raises $10m to build a natural-language layer for robot control

AI · Worldwide

OpenAI launches Agents API and GPT-Live-1 voice API

Two new developer APIs shipped in one day. The Agents API is a managed service for building cloud agents with long-running sessions, orchestration and tool use, built on the Codex harness. GPT-Live-1 brings full-duplex voice to the API with custom voices and telephony support, scoring 80.1% on interactivity benchmarks (up from 45.4%) at $0.05 per minute.

OpenAI pauses Pro sign-ups as Astra demand strains capacity

OpenAI has temporarily stopped accepting new Pro tier subscriptions, saying those accounts place the most load on its systems. The pause comes days after GPT-6 Astra launched and suggests compute demand is outrunning supply.

Anthropic accuses Chinese labs of systematic distillation

A new Anthropic report details what it calls persistent distillation campaigns by Alibaba, Moonshot AI and DeepSeek, alleging the efforts have escalated in recent months as competition between frontier labs intensifies.

Australian Tech

Social media bill passes parliament, fines lifted to $99m

Legislation doubling the maximum penalties under Australia's youth social media ban has cleared the Senate with Greens support. The bill also grants eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant new information-gathering powers to enforce the regime.

Metacognition raises $10m to build an AI layer for robots

Founded by Anton van den Hengel, Stephen Gould and Paul Dalby, the new 'neolab' is building a natural-language interface that lets large language models safely control robots and complex systems. The $10m round backs research at the frontier of embodied AI.

NSW announces $150m fund to back university spin-offs

The NSW government will co-invest in startups and scaleups emerging from public university research, starting with a July 2027 launch. The fund takes equity stakes, a notable shift from grant-based models.