OpenAI has been making headlines the past few weeks and not only because of AI-generated art. The San Francisco startup launched OpenAI Startup Fund last year in partnership with Microsoft on the premise of making ‘big early bets’ on the best and brightest in AI. They recently announced Converge, a $1M equity investment and 5-week accelerator for early-stage AI companies. Last week we learned they led Mem’s $23.5M Series A, and this week they announced leading a sizeable $50M Series C for Descript.

Descript is a video editor to make editing recordings as easy as editing a doc. YouTubers, podcasters, and influencers have been using and loving it since its first launch in 2017. The latest update has a lot of folks excited. The New Descript uses AI to edit the "ums," "likes," "you knows," and "uhs" out of your recordings and clones your voice to add new lines to your script. There are 30+ new features, which also include the ability to insert media into your project with keystrokes, green screen your background away, and add stock b-roll footage.

The relationship that Descript is building with OpenAI could give the video platform an edge. Startups in the OpenAI Startup Fund don’t just get the boost in funding – they also get early access to OpenAI’s future systems. Descript CEO Andrew Mason defines OpenAI as part investor, part partner, highlighting that “Sometimes you find investors where there’s also strategic overlap.”

The team is running a live tutorial and AMA on Thursday if you want to get a closer look. Or just get to it and…

• Listening.io > reading? Turn articles into audio and play them in your podcast app.
• Build launched a 4-week cohort + community for starting a side hustle.
• Fowl Language by Duolingo will help you get ready for the World Cup with cheers or insults in other languages.
• Beni is a planet-conscious browser extension making secondhand shopping seamless.

Any Distance, the privacy-focused activity-tracking app, just launched its latest update. Whether you run, cycle, hike, snowboard, ski, or push a stroller, you can share your accomplishments with beautiful and customizable templates.

Other features include distance-based goals, cool rewards like discounts, community challenges, and more.