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👋 Good Morning. Google’s dressing you with Doppl. Developers just got a new open-source playground with Gemma 3n. And Nike dodged disaster (barely) while prepping for a billion-dollar tariff hit.

The tech is getting weirder. The macro picture is getting tighter. Let’s break it down—without the noise.

(As always, send tips or cool tools—I'm all ears.)

What’s Merging Today:
• 🧠 Google drops Gemma 3n
• 👕 Try on clothes with a selfie
•👟 Nike beats gloomy earnings forecast
• 🛠️ New AI tools to analyze, automate, and scale you

MERGE MINDBLOWERS

🧬 You have viral DNA in your genes
About 8% of your DNA comes from ancient viruses that infected our ancestors and stuck around. You're part human, part retrovirus.

🛰️ GPS wouldn’t work without Einstein
GPS satellites account for time dilation from general relativity. Without Einstein’s theory correcting for gravitational time shifts, your iPhone would be off by 10km a day.

🌡️ Octopuses taste with their arms
Each of their 2,000+ suckers contains taste receptors, so an octopus can taste and touch you at the same time—with its arms.

⚡ Bananas are naturally radioactive
They contain potassium-40, a radioactive isotope. Don’t panic—your body can handle it. But eat enough bananas, and technically, you’d trip a radiation detector.

🔁 The world’s most efficient memory? Slime mold.
A single-cell organism with no brain can map out complex mazes and remember food locations—beating AI at optimization problems in certain tests.

TODAY IN AI

Google unveils Gemma 3n: open-source, fast, and dev-friendly

Google just launched Gemma 3n, the newest addition to its open-weight LLM family. Designed with developers in mind, Gemma 3n supports multiple frameworks (PyTorch, TensorFlow, JAX), comes in lightweight 2B and 7B parameter models, and is optimized for both local and cloud performance.

Google claims 3n offers improved safety tuning, stronger multilingual capabilities, and faster inference—plus plug-and-play compatibility with Hugging Face and Kaggle.

Why it matters: While Meta and Mistral hog the “open model” spotlight, Gemma 3n proves Google’s not backing down. It’s a smart play: give away just enough to win developer loyalty while subtly funneling users toward paid Gemini APIs.

TODAY IN TECH

Google’s new AI app lets you try on outfits with a selfie

Say hello to Doppl, Google’s experimental new AI app that lets you visualize what different outfits would look like on your body—no changing room required. You upload a selfie, pick an item (currently limited to tops), and Doppl generates an ultra-realistic image of you wearing it, accounting for posture, lighting, and body type.

Right now it’s Android-only and in early testing through Google’s “AI Test Kitchen,” with plans to expand features and clothing types soon.

Why it matters: This is a big leap for online shopping. If Google gets this right—and keeps it fast, private, and non-creepy—it could reduce return rates and set a new standard for virtual try-ons. For fashion brands, it’s a try-before-you-buy revolution.

TODAY IN BUSINESS

Nike braces for a $1B tariff hit—but beat worst-quarter expectations

Nike announced an anticipated $1 billion cost burden due to new U.S. tariffs tied to the “Liberation Day” trade policy—primarily affecting footwear made in China, Vietnam, and Indonesia, which account for nearly 60% of its global output.

Still, for Q4 FY2025, Nike posted $11.1 billion in revenue—a 12% drop from a year ago, yet better than the 14.9% decline analysts forecast. EPS came in at $0.14, slightly above expectations. Shares jumped ~10% after-hours on renewed confidence that the bottom may be near.

Highlights & Hurdles:

• Tariff Impact: CFO Matt Friend says the pricing pressure from tariffs “represents a new and meaningful cost headwind,” leading Nike to reduce China-based production in the U.S. market from 16% today to high single digits by May 2026.

• Surgical price hikes: Expect tiered U.S. product price increases this fall—$5–10 on key items—to help offset the tariff burden.

• Strategic shifts: Nike is reorganizing its sourcing, upping costs controls, and channeling more into sports-focused marketing. Its running line (Pegasus, Vomero) is finally showing growth after underperforming for a year.

• Macro traction: Despite macroeconomic and consumer pressures, Nike’s Q4 matched pre-announced targets—suggesting the worst could be behind them.

Why it matters: Nike may have hit its softest quarter in years, but skirting ahead of expectations and planning for future tariff shocks shows savvy. The brand’s pivot to price resilience, agile sourcing, and product-led renewal—especially in running—could stabilize performance. Still, success hinges on execution: balancing consumer price sensitivity with long-term cost control, or face losing share to nimble competitors.

MERGE TOOLS

AI tools worth your time

🧩 Twenty 
The #1 open‑source CRM. Built on GitHub, it’s free, customizable, and designed for dev teams to manage sales, bugs, and feature requests with ease.

💬 Pally — AI Relationship Management 
Aggregate all your conversations across LinkedIn, email, and Slack. AI surfaces your key connections & nudges you to follow up.

🛠️ Pythagora 2.0 
An all‑in‑one LLM dev platform that lets you build, test, and deploy AI tools without code. Strong traction among early-stage teams.

🌐 mysite.ai 
Build your website with AI and start generating leads in minutes—no design or dev skills needed.

👔 HeyBoss AI Boss Mode 
Let an AI “boss” oversee your business—drafts sites, launches campaigns, and manages daily operations with simple prompts.

📬 Beehiiv 
Launch and grow your newsletter like a pro.
→ Your audience gets a 30-day free trial + 20% OFF for 3 months.

🛠️ Want More? Check out our Top 50 AI Tools.

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WHAT ELSE IS MERGING

Beyond the feed

🖼️ FLUX.1 Kontext [dev] image editor goes open-source
Black Forest Labs releases a 12B-parameter visual editing model that enables pixel-perfect in-context changes—character, style, and composition preserved—with real-time speed. Available via Hugging Face and API partners, it's pushing open image editing forward.

🚀 DeepSeek R2 launch stalls over CEO doubts & chip shortages
China’s top AI firm delays its next-gen model after CEO insists performance isn't ready. U.S. chip export bans—especially on Nvidia’s H20—are leaving data centers short on power to run the upgrade.

⚖️ Meta wins big in U.S. AI copyright case
A U.S. judge sided with Meta, ruling that training Llama with snippets from 13 authors doesn't automatically break copyright if there's no proven harm—though he warned other cases might still succeed.

🎶 Suno acquires WavTool to power next-gen music creation
AI music startup Suno just acquired WavTool, a pro-grade browser DAW, to supercharge tools for songwriters and producers. The integration will focus on real-time prompts, stems, and mixing capabilities.

🎨 AI recreates Pixar animation style—flawlessly
A viral demo from Steven Coffey shows a model recreating Pixar-style scenes from just a single image frame. Artists and studios are equal parts impressed and uneasy.

QUICK POLL

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Until next time,

Matt & The Morning Merge team.