• OpenAI said GPT-5.2, its latest model, is its best yet at doing "professional knowledge work."
• In a benchmark test, OpenAI said it outperformed industry professionals in tasks across 44 occupations.
• GPT-5.2's release comes just days after OpenAI CEO Sam Altman declared a "code red" in response to Google's Gemini 3.

OpenAI released its anticipated update to GPT-5 on Thursday, boasting that the new AI is "the most capable model series yet for professional knowledge work."

"We designed GPT‑5.2 to unlock even more economic value for people; it's better at creating spreadsheets, building presentations, writing code, perceiving images, understanding long contexts, using tools, and handling complex, multi-step project," the company said in a statement.

In a benchmark test called GDPval, OpenAI said its new AI model can outperform "industry professionals at well-specified knowledge work tasks spanning 44 occupations."

"GPT‑5.2 Thinking produced outputs for GDPval tasks at >11x the speed and <1% the cost of expert professionals, suggesting that when paired with human oversight, GPT‑5.2 can help with professional work," the company said.

And in a note that is sure to catch the attention of bankers, OpenAI wrote that in an internal benchmark of junior investment banking analyst spreadsheet modeling tasks — "such as putting together a three-statement model for a Fortune 500 company with proper formatting and citations, or building a leveraged buyout model for a take-private" — the new model's score per task was "9.3% higher than GPT‑5.1's, rising from 59.1% to 68.4%" on average.

The company also touted its gains in agentic coding ability.

The release comes just over a week after OpenAI CEO Sam Altman declared a "code red" in a private message to employees, marshaling more resources to ChatGPT amid increasing competition from Google and other companies.

Google has been considered by many in tech to be gaining, if not surpassing, OpenAI in the AI race with its recent release of Gemini 3 AI model.

This is a developing story…

• Ahead of the premiere of her Eras Tour docuseries, Taylor Swift appeared on "The Late Show."
• Swift said she values career longevity and admires artists who can "keep a good thing going."
• Swift said she's aware that some people would prefer her to "go away," but she doesn't want to.

Taylor Swift has been known to accept feedback from fans and critics, but there's one request she refuses to heed: "Go away."

Ahead of the premiere of her Disney+ docuseries, "The End of an Era," Swift appeared on "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" to discuss her recent achievements and milestones.

When Colbert asked Swift who she could turn to for advice, she listed rock star Stevie Nicks and pop producer Max Martin as confidants.

"What I look up to the most in people is career longevity — career longevity, friendship longevity, longevity in their relationships, you know? How do you keep a good thing going?" Swift said.

"I think there are certain corners of our society that really love that and look up to longevity," she continued. "There are also corners that are like, 'Give someone else a turn! Can't you just go away so we can talk about how good you were?' And I'm like, 'I don't want to.'"

Swift has faced accusations of overexposure throughout her career, but particularly in the last few years. Her cross-continental, 149-show Eras Tour, which concluded in December 2024, garnered extensive media coverage and consistently went viral on social media. The New Yorker said Swift had achieved "complete domination over popular culture."

When Swift released "The Tortured Poets Department" halfway through the tour's two-year run, fans and critics alike called the album overlong and overindulgent. When it topped the Billboard 200 for 17 weeks, fans of other artists complained that Swift was sabotaging her fellow pop stars, including Billie Eilish and Charli XCX, by preventing their albums from reaching No. 1 on the chart.

Swift's newest album, "The Life of a Showgirl," was met with similar reproach. In his review for The Atlantic, Spencer Kornhaber wrote, "'Showgirl' is the sound of an overworked and overexposed entertainer reaching the mountaintop to find something worse than disappointment: burnout." Swift's prolificacy and sales tactics have been described as shameless and excessive.

Still, Swift has refused to shrink away from the spotlight. The first two episodes of "The End of an Era" will be available to stream on Friday, along with an extended version of her Eras Tour concert movie, featuring a new segment with songs from "The Tortured Poets Department." The remaining four episodes of the docuseries will be released in pairs over the next two weeks.

During her interview with Colbert, Swift also joked that she prefers to think of herself as "passionate" and "hyperactive," rather than a workaholic.

"When I take time off, it's always just like, I can't slow down the fact that I need to get up and do a lot of things today. But I can change what those things are," she said. "I can figure out how to chill out, but I'm never gonna be a chill person."

• Even if you don't love Champagne, you might enjoy an alternative (more affordable) sparkling wine.
• We spoke to a sommelier who said many people actually prefer prosecco's citrusy, fresh flavor.
• The next time you want a warm, full-bodied red sparkling wine, reach for a bottle of Lambrusco.

It's one of the most celebratory times of the year, bringing an onslaught of toast-filled festivities.

Though Champagne is often the de facto alcohol filling flutes, the popular sparkling French wine isn't ideal for everyone's palate — or budget, particularly when it comes to serving a big group.

Madison Aspinwall, a California-based sommelier, told Business Insider that there are plenty of high-quality, affordable alternatives to real Champagne, which can cost well over $60 per bottle.

In fact, some decent bottles of sparkling wine can be found for less than half that price.

Here are a few of Aspinwall's recommendations you can feel confident about grabbing for your next celebration.

Prosecco can be an affordable alternative to Champagne

Made from Glera grapes in Prosecco, Italy, this sparkling white wine can be a less expensive (but still delicious) swap for Champagne.

"Prosecco is rarely over $30 a bottle," Aspinwall said. "It's made in a totally different style from Champagne, but I find it equally delicious."

She said that many people who try different sparkling wines for the first time actually tend to prefer prosecco over Champagne, finding the former tastes fresher, cleaner, and more citrusy.

For a classic, easy-to-find option, Aspinwall recommends La Marca, an extra-dry prosecco that runs between $15 and $20 for a 750-milliliter bottle.

Brut prosecco is the perfect option if you prefer acidic flavors

Brut prosecco is a solid starter sparkling wine.

"I think a brut prosecco is the best for someone who is just getting into sparkling wines and doesn't like the taste of Champagne," Aspinwall said.

She added that brut is on the lower end when it comes to sweetness (specifically, it has between 0 and 12 grams of residual sugar per liter), giving it a fresher, more acidic taste than other varieties.

Aspinwall told BI that one of her go-to choices is Pizzolato, a brut prosecco. A 750-milliliter bottle typically costs between $20 and $25.

"It tastes amazing, and it's in the most fun bottle with funky packaging," she added.

Fruit-forward Lambrusco is a fitting choice for the holiday season

On the hunt for a sparkling wine that feels special? Turn to Lambrusco, a sparkling Italian red that comes in a range of sweetness levels.

"I think it's perfect for the holiday season because, as a red wine, it has a bit more warmth to it than a prosecco or Champagne," Aspinwall said.

She added that this type of wine tends to have more body, tannins, and fruit-forward flavors, such as cherry, raspberry, and strawberry.

You can also get it in white and rosé variations.

"It can be super complex, unique, and fun to experiment with if you're just getting into sparkling wine," she said, adding that one of her top recommendations is Broletto Lambrusco.

A 750-milliliter bottle typically retails for between $16 and $20, depending on the retailer.

If you love sweet wine, pour yourself some demi-sec prosecco

For those who prefer a very sweet wine, Aspinwall recommended turning to a demi-sec variety.

This type of prosecco has between 32 and 50 grams of residual sugars per liter, meaning it's generally sweeter than a brut prosecco.

"It's perfect for people who are looking for something that's really approachable," she said.

Consider trying a demi-sec variety from La Marca — a 750-milliliter bottle can cost between $15 and $20.

Moscato d'Asti is another sweet sparkling wine that pairs well with dessert

One of Aspinwall's favorite sparkling wines is Moscato d'Asti.

The sparkling white Italian wine, which she described as tropical, fruity, and juicy, pairs well with certain sweet treats.

"I absolutely love Moscato d'Asti with soft-serve ice cream because it's a really cool dessert combination," she told BI. "It has that fruity, delicious tart acidity, but it's also very sweet, so it's super easy for people who are just getting into sparkling wine to enjoy."

Consider picking up Vietti Moscato d'Asti, which retails between $15 and $23 for a 750-milliliter bottle.

• Yelp ranked the most beloved chains in the country according to customer reviews and search volume.
• Popular chains, such as Dave's Hot Chicken, In-N-Out, and Texas Roadhouse, topped the list.
• Lesser-known chains, such as First Watch and bb.q chicken, also ranked highly.

A new ranking of the most popular restaurant chains in the US reveals that both iconic spots and lesser-known favorites are winning over customers.

Yelp ranked the most beloved restaurant chains in the country based on a variety of factors, including average rating, customer reviews, repeat page views, and search volume.

The list, which was released on Tuesday, featured well-known national chains like In-N-Out, Olive Garden, and Chili's, as well as some hot up-and-comers like Dave's Hot Chicken and bb.q Chicken.

Here are the 20 most beloved restaurant chains in America, according to Yelp.

20. Shake Shack

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 48%

Number of locations (2024): 373

19. Jet's Pizza

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 69%

Number of locations (2024): 450

18. Sweetgreen

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 51%

Number of locations (2024): 246

17. Habit Burger & Grill

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 49%

Number of locations (2024): 377

16. Outback Steakhouse

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 51%

Number of locations (2024): 675

15. Chili's

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 51%

Number of locations (2024): 1,209

14. P.F. Chang's

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 50%

Number of locations (2024): 221

13. The Cheesecake Factory

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 48%

Number of locations (2024): 215

12. Denny's

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 64%

Number of locations (2024): 1,334

11. Blaze Pizza

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 63%

Number of locations (2024): 265

10. LongHorn Steakhouse

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 57%

Number of locations (2024): 594

9. Carrabba's Italian Grill

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 59%

Number of locations (2024): 210

8. Olive Garden

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 58%

Number of locations (2024): 923

7. Mountain Mike's Pizza

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 63%

Number of locations (2024): 299

6. Texas Roadhouse

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 57%

Number of locations (2024): 664

5. BJ's Restaurants

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 60%

Number of locations (2024): 218

4. In-N-Out Burger

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 66%

Number of locations (2024): 415

3. First Watch

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 73%

Number of locations (2024): 572

2. bb.q Chicken

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 71%

Number of locations (2024): 208

1. Dave's Hot Chicken

Percent of reviews that were four or five stars: 71%

Number of locations (2024): 245

• Keeper, an AI dating startup, believes its matchmaking tech can pair people with their soulmates.
• The dating company raised $4 million in pre-seed funding last year.
• Keeper shared the most recent version of its pitch deck with Business Insider.

Keeper, an AI matchmaking startup, thinks it can help deliver your "soulmate" to you. And if it can't, it'll let you know.

"We're saying we actually know who could be your soulmate or not," Jake Kozloski, Keeper's CEO, told Business Insider. "We're not going to waste your time and pretend that a hundred thousand of these people could be. We'll tell you no."

Founded in 2022, the dating platform uses layers of algorithms and AI models to match people who sign up for its service. The startup is now disclosing for the first time, exclusively to Business Insider, that it raised a $4 million pre-seed investment in October 2024, led by Lightbank and Lakehouse Ventures. Goodwater Capital and Champion Hill Ventures participated in the round, among others.

Investors "see AI as an inflection point in the dating app landscape" and an opportunity to "disrupt the incumbents," Kozloski said.

Keeper isn't the only startup attempting to shake up the online dating market. Other AI matchmaking apps, such as Sitch and Amata, have raised millions to build next-generation dating apps. Dating app incumbents like Tinder and Bumble are also making plays with AI-powered experiences.

Kozloski said the company's values were another piece of its pitch that attracted some investors.

"They feel like there's a marriage crisis adjacent to the whole Elon Musk fertility crisis stuff that he talks about," said Kozloski, who described Keeper as being "friendly with the pronatalist movement."

Wanting kids, though, isn't a requirement to use Keeper, Kozloski added.

Since launching, Keeper has had more than 1.5 million sign-ups, and about 300,000 of those have made accounts, Kozloski said. Among that pool, there have been a "small number" of matches. Keeper didn't share exactly how many matches it's made, but according to its pitch deck, 10% of dates from its beta version resulted in marriage. With its funding, Keeper has been building out its matchmaking technology over the past year.

Keeper is limited to heterosexual couples right now, and doesn't offer explicit options for different gender identities.

"We basically have to build a new algorithm for homosexual relationships, which we're happy to do and we will do eventually, but for now, we want to get to product market fit with our core product first," Kozloski said. "Frankly, heterosexual relationships, especially for finding life partnership, seems to be a bigger market, a stronger market for us right now."

Making a profile on Keeper is a sit-down process. The initial form to make an account asks for the standard details of many dating apps (like your age or height), as well as academic test scores (including SATs), your career ambitions, salary, and net worth. It even encourages taking an external personality test. After you fill out the initial onboarding questionnaire, there are 13 more steps, ranging from uploading photos to sharing your philosophy on love.

"We don't let our users create their own profiles," Kozloski said. Keeper uses the information it gathers to curate a profile for you.

Kozloski said Keeper uses a non-AI algorithm first to streamline potential matches, focusing on data points like age range initially.

"We use LLMs once we have your top hundred that our other algorithms have identified," he said. "The LLMs are trained on our matchmaking insights that we've learned so far, and so they can narrow down those last hundred and do the final pass of, 'OK, who actually is worth offering among these.'"

Some of the AI matchmaking comes into play when analyzing "general attractiveness" and users' specific attributes, like baldness or hair color, Kozloski said. The startup has also partnered with a team of researchers at Stanford, Kozloski said, who help train the LLMs (Keeper provides anonymized data to the research team).

However, Keeper isn't fully automated, and for the time being, includes human matchmakers in the process. If there's a match, Keeper connects the two people over text message.

The startup has a complicated payment structure with a hefty price tag — but only for men.

Keeper has male users sign a "marriage bounty" that typically costs $50,000 (if the user gets married) and has them pay $5,000 for any dates from the service (the date fees go toward the total bounty cost, Kozloski said).

Read the most recent version of Keeper's pitch deck.

Note: Keeper has shared an updated version of its pitch deck, which it is now sharing with investors, that includes new details since its raise in October 2024. Some details have been redacted.

Keeper claims its AI-powered matchmaking is the 'most accurate'

It touts that 1 in 10 dates lead to engagements

"1 in 10 Keeper first dates have led to an engagement," the slide says.

It highlights the size of the matchmaking market

Keeper describes the matchmaking market as "old school yet shockingly massive," per the slide.

It then says that matchmaking could be enhanced by technology

"With the opportunity to 10x," the slide says. "When technology provides perfect matches, matchmaking will be the best way to meet your partner."

Then, it introduces Keeper's product

"The AI matchmaker that will introduce you to your soulmate on the first match," the slides says. It also includes product imagery.

It showcases how its beta version performed

"Our v1 worked extremely well," the slide says.

It says that 10% of dates lead to marriage.

The deck shows press and social media content about the startup

Keeper showcases how many people have signed up

It says it has had 1.5 million sign-ups. "This makes us the largest pool of any traditional matchmaker," the slides says. It lists competitors like Tawkify, Keeper, Ditto, Sitch, and Known Dating.

Keeper explains its network effect

"Everyone signs up if we deliver soulmates on the first match," the slide says.

"The first mover quickly becomes a monopoly," it says.

Then, it introduces its founders

Here's what the slide says:

Jake Kozloski: Founder, CEO

• Repeat founder with previous exit
• 8 years startup product management and growth roles
• 10 years of dating apps as a user; now happily married to wife Aliia

Toban Wiebe: Co-Founder, Head of AI

• PhD from Penn in economic/statistical modeling of Marriage Markets
• 8 years industry experience in ML/DS, most recently at Instacart and Uber
• Met his wife Dee 10 years ago in grad school via OkCupid

It also lists the researchers the startup is working with

Here are the names of the researchers:

• Michal Kosinski: PhD, Cambridge
• Geoffrey Miller: PhD, Stanford
• Naman Gupta: PhD Student, Stanford
• Ignacio Rios Uribe: PhD, Stanford

Keeper explains why it's raising capital

"We're raising to scale profitable human-in-the-loop matchmaking to $2M in annual revenue," the slide says.

The deck includes its founder's email

As well as an appendix with additional data

The deck includes a slide about marriage rates decreasing

"80% of young singles want to get married," the slide says. "40% actually will." It cites data from Match Group and data scientist Allen Downey.

It then maps out the incumbent dating app landscape

Dating apps are "bad at creating relationships, worth billions," the slide says. "Imagine the value of the first product that's great at it."

It lists matchmaking competitors, too

"Matchmakers can't scale," the slide says.

Keeper shows how its LLM and vision models work

"LLMs and vision models enable scalable matchmaking for the first time in history," the slides says.

It goes into more depth on its tech

"We've built the most accurate process in the world," the slide says.

Here are the steps the slide lays out:

• In-depth preference collection
• Accurately measure all traits
• AI evaluates every pair
• Offer only very strong matches
• Feedback refines future matches

It then explains its pricing model

"We earn more, faster, by aligning with users' incentives," the slide says.

Its current model, which has humans involved in matchmaking, is free for women and costs men $5,000 per date. For male users, the marriage bounty costs $50,000, and the slide says that Keeper has contracted $14 million "so far."

Keeper outlines that in a future model, where the tech is fully automated, dates will cost $250, and the marriage bounty contract will cost $5,000.

• Kate Winslet thinks the term 'nepo baby' is silly, and she tells her kids to ignore it.
• Winslet's directorial debut, "Goodbye June," which is out in December, was written by her son.
• She came to his defense, claiming it would have been made "with or without her."

Kate Winslet thinks the term nepo baby is "silly."

The Oscar winner and mom-of-three told the BBC on Wednesday that her kids, who have followed her into showbiz "aren't getting a leg up."

"There are lots and lots of people in the world whose children go into a similar family business, whether it's being a judge or a lawyer or a doctor," she said. "Part of it actually is teaching them to ignore the white noise of silly terms like nepo baby, which you can't really do anything about."

Winslet, 50, was speaking in an interview promoting her upcoming film "Goodbye June," which marks her editorial debut and will be released in select US and UK theaters December 12, and on Netflix December 24. Her eldest son, Joe Anders, 21, wrote the screenplay.

She said that Anders had expressed concern that people may think the film, which he wrote on a screenwriting course, was picked up only because of his famous parents. But Winslet defended his talent."The film would've been made with or without me. The script is so, so good," she said.

Anders' father is the acclaimed film director Sam Mendes, 60, who was married to Winslet for seven years until their split in 2010. Anders starred alongside his mom in the 2023 movie "Lee," and also appeared in the Oscar-nominated war film "1917," which was directed by his father.

Mia Threapleton, Winslet's 25-year-old daughter, is also a rising star. She had a starring role in Wes Anderson's latest film, "The Phoenician Scheme," which was released in May. It comes after she played Winslet's daughter in the 2022 BAFTA award-winning TV drama "I Am Ruth."

The youngest of Winslet's children, 12-year-old Bear Blaze Winslet, has yet to grace the silver screen, but has already expressed an interest. During a 2021 appearance on "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" Winslet shared jokingly that at age 7, Bear Blaze told her he wanted "to be an actress."