Token Town is a weekly show where Aaron Francis and Ian Landsman break down what actually mattered in AI software development this week—new tools, model updates, workflows, and shipping lessons. Fast, practical, and aimed at builders who want signal over hype.
Token Town is no more. In an excerpt from this week's Mostly Technical, Ian and Aaron talk about why Token Town is coming to an end.
RIP to a real one.
24 Jul 2026
009: OpenAI & Hugging Face
Aaron & Ian discuss an OpenAI model breaking out and attacking Hugging Face, Cursor Router, the upcoming Kimi K3 model, and so much more.
(00:00) - Is Sol doing too much?
(04:36) - OpenAI & Hugging Face
(10:31) - Cursor Router
(16:03) - Claude Cowork lets users teach AI skills via screen recording
(19:08) - Kimi K3
(24:32) - Language Model Builder
(27:08) - Cursor rebuilt SQLite in Rust using AI agents
(32:57) - Q&A
Links:
OpenAI and Hugging Face partner to address security incident during model evaluation (https://openai.com/index/hugging-face-model-evaluation-security-incident/)
Cursor Router – 60% cost reduction (https://x.com/cursor_ai/status/2079993729532989500?s=20)
Claude Cowork – Teach AI Skills Via Screen Recording (https://x.com/claudeai/status/2079595988998554047?s=20)
Kimi K3: Open Frontier Intelligence (https://www.kimi.com/blog/kimi-k3)
Kimi K3 exploits Redis 0day in 27 minutes (https://x.com/Fried_rice/status/2080059356322918777)
Language Model Builder (https://languagemodelbuilder.com/)
Cursor – AI agents rebuild SQLite in Rust (https://x.com/cursor_ai/status/2079256614238814551?s=20)
17 Jul 2026
008: Aaron's training an AI model?
Aaron & Ian discuss Linus telling off the haters, the US getting back in the AI game, Claude for K-12, and Aaron's custom model that he's training.
(00:00) - Linus Torvalds tells AI haters to fork off
(05:29) - Claude for K-12
(10:23) - Open Weights Models: Competing with China?
(16:38) - What's In Our Stack?
(26:41) - Q&A
(36:53) - OnePassword and AI Integration
(42:39) - Building with Claude: Artifacts and MCP Connections
Links:
Linus tells the haters to fork off (https://www.theregister.com/ai-and-ml/2026/07/15/linus-torvalds-tells-ai-haters-to-fork-off/5271894)
Claude for K-12 (https://claude.com/solutions/teachers)
Inkling (https://thinkingmachines.ai/news/introducing-inkling/)
Solo (https://soloterm.com)
1Password for Agents (https://x.com/1password/status/2077743858239094854?s=46)
Claude Code artifacts & MCP (https://x.com/ClaudeDevs/status/2077489907350856038?s=20)
10 Jul 2026
007: GPT 5.6, GPT-Live, and more!
Aaron & Ian discuss the release of GPT 5.6, OpenAI seemingly copying Anthropic, every billionaire getting in the game, Aaron's feeling that we’re getting closer to the sci-fi future, and they both wonder if the release of new frontier models even matters any more.
(00:00) - GPT 5.6 Is Out!
(07:32) - Does It Matter? The Relevance of AI Intelligence
(11:57) - ChatGPT Work
(14:38) - GPT-Live
(20:40) - Zuck Is Back!
(26:07) - Q&A
(30:28) - Grok 4.5
(35:03) - Introducing Claude's "Reflect"
(37:01) - The Validity of AI Benchmarks
(40:22) - Will 5.6 have a better "bedside manner"?
Links:
GPT 5.6 (https://openai.com/index/gpt-5-6/)
ChatGPT Work (https://x.com/OpenAI/status/2075274271845404744)
GPT-Live (https://openai.com/index/introducing-gpt-live/)
Muse Spark 1.1 (https://ai.meta.com/blog/introducing-muse-spark-meta-model-api/)
Grok 4.5 (https://cursor.com/blog/grok-4-5)
Claude's "Reflect" (https://x.com/claudeai/status/2075225957711929667?s=20)
3 Jul 2026
006: Fable 5 is (finally) back!
Aaron & Ian discuss the return of Fable 5, why every AI company is seemingly moving agents to the cloud, debate how good of a guy Sam Altman really is, and more.
Sponsored by Bento - https://bentonow.com
(00:00) - Intro
(01:00) - Fable 5 Is Back
(08:46) - Cursor Mobile App
(14:35) - Amp launches Agents in Orbs
(20:46) - Is Sam Altman a good guy?
(25:21) - What's Our Stack?
(31:28) - Q&A
(39:03) - Claude Science
(46:06) - Sonnet 5
Links:
Redeploying Fable 5 (https://www.anthropic.com/news/redeploying-fable-5)
Cursor Mobile (https://cursor.com/blog/ios-mobile-app)
Agents in Orbs (https://ampcode.com/news/agents-in-orbs)
Sam Altman wants to give the public a stake in Open AI (https://x.com/FT/status/2072559569335648368)
Claude Science (https://claude.com/product/claude-science)
Sonnet 5 (https://www.anthropic.com/news/claude-sonnet-5)
12 Jun 2026
005: Fable 5 is here!
Aaron & Ian cover the long-awaited release of Fable 5 & Mythos 5 - does it live up to the hype? Is it worth the cost? Why can't Ian get access to Mythos?
Plus Claude adds nested subagents, Chinese models on the rise, and more
Sponsored by Bento (https://bentonow.com/).
Links:
Fable 5 & Mythos 5 (https://www.anthropic.com/news/claude-fable-5-mythos-5)
Claude adds nested subagents (https://x.com/bcherny/status/2064327225504403752?s=20)
Tokens for Good (https://tokensforgood.ai/)
OpenCode AI data (https://opencode.ai/data)
FrontierCode (https://x.com/cognition/status/2064061031912288715)
5 Jun 2026
004: Claude 5x is all you need w/ Josh Pigford
This week Ian is joined by Josh Pigford, founder of Baremetrics, to talk about Codex Sites, Alphabet raising money for AI, Josh's personal AI setup, and so much more.
Sponsored by Bento (https://bentonow.com/).
Links:
Josh Pigford (http://joshpigford.com)
Microsoft Scout (https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/blog/2026/06/02/introducing-microsoft-scout-your-always-on-personal-agent/)
Uber caps AI spend (https://techcrunch.com/2026/06/02/uber-caps-employee-ai-spending-after-blowing-through-budget-in-four-months/)
Codex Sites (https://developers.openai.com/codex/sites)
Conductor (https://www.conductor.build)
Polyscope (https://getpolyscope.com)
Alphabet's trying to raise $80 billion (https://blog.google/alphabet/investor-presentation-june-2026/)
Anthropic submits an S-1 (https://www.anthropic.com/news/confidential-draft-s1-sec)
29 May 2026
003: Opus 4.8 & Pope Leo XIV
This week Aaron & Ian talk about Claude Opus 4.8, Pope Leo XIV's thoughts on AI, dynamic workflows in Claude, and the absolute hottest take you've ever heard on a podcast.
Sponsored by Bento (https://bentonow.com/).
Links:
Opus 4.8 (https://x.com/claudeai/status/2060042702150930686?s=20)
Dynamic Workflows (https://x.com/claudeai/status/2060042710753382816)
Claude Code performance improvements (https://x.com/ClaudeDevs/status/2059701677981413812)
Anthropic prepares Mythos 1 (https://www.testingcatalog.com/anthropic-prepares-mythos-1-for-claude-code-and-claude-security/?utm_source=tldrnewsletter)
Claude Code's usage command (https://x.com/bcherny/status/2057476878110261587)
AI trends in the US (https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2026/05/28/united-states-ai-adoption-shows-steady-growth-but-distribution-remains-uneven/#:~:text=More%20than%2030%20percent%20of,should%20we%20take%20from%20it%3F)
Pope Leo XIV's Encyclical (https://www.anthropic.com/news/chris-olah-pope-leo-encyclical)
22 May 2026
002: Karpathy is back!
This week on Token Town, Aaron & Ian talk about the return of Karpathy, the avalanche of new AI announcements from Google, Mythos & Symfony CVE's, & more.
Sponsored by Bento (https://bentonow.com/).
Links:
OpenAI employees selling shares (https://x.com/WSJ/status/2053645525644169590?s=20)
Karpathy is at Anthropic (https://x.com/karpathy/status/2056753169888334312?s=20)
OpenAI trial verdict (https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/05/18/technology/openai-trial-verdict-altman-musk?unlocked_article_code=1.jVA.tEz9.76hsEiRWDMXz&smid=url-share)
Gemini 3.5 Flash (https://x.com/Google/status/2056788266872140232)
QuiverAI (https://x.com/QuiverAI/status/2056755329774338395?s=20)
Gemini Spark (https://gemini.google/overview/agent/spark/)
Mythos & Symfony (https://symfony.com/blog/claude-mythos-audited-symfony-and-found-19-vulnerabilities)
15 May 2026
001: What is Anthropic Doing?!
In the first-ever episode of Token Town, Aaron & Ian break down pricing changes for Claude -p and the Agent SDK, a temporary 50% increase to Claude's limits, leaps in hacking ability, and more.
Sponsored by Bento (https://bentonow.com).
Links:
Claude pricing changes (https://x.com/ClaudeDevs/status/2054610152817619388?s=20)
'Anthropic beats OpenAI on business adoption' (https://ramp.com/leading-indicators/ai-index-may-2026)
Claude Code weekly limits are 50% higher (https://x.com/ClaudeDevs/status/2054639777685934564)
Solo (https://soloterm.com)
Amp (https://ampcode.com)
Superpowers (https://github.com/obra/superpowers)
Mythos & cybersecurity (https://x.com/aisecurityinst/status/2054589763173126339?s=46)
24 Mar 2026
Preview
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