PubNub Functions offer a serverless, distributed framework to manage and process data in real-time, enabling applications to transform, re-route, and filter data with low latency and high uptime. They support various integrations and libraries, facilitating tasks such as moderating chat messages and analyzing sentiment. Moderation can be achieved via simple banned-word lists or more sophisticated AI and machine learning models, including integrations with services like Tisane.ai and HuggingFace. Sentiment analysis allows applications to react to user emotions in real time, using external services accessed through REST APIs. PubNub's Events & Actions service can store messages for further analysis, offering compatibility with platforms like Amazon S3 and Apache Kafka. Recent updates to PubNub Functions have improved their usability with enhancements like a Functions API for easier deployment, an improved in-browser editor, and support for versioning and zero-downtime deployments.