Meta Reveals AI Assistant and Glasses for Facebook Livestreaming

 

Meta Reveals AI Assistant and Glasses for Facebook Livestreaming

On September 27th, in Menlo Park, California, Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg unveiled an array of new AI-driven products designed for consumers. These innovations include cutting-edge image generation bots, intelligent glasses capable of answering questions, and updates to their virtual reality (VR) headset.

Zuckerberg emphasized that these products aim to bridge the gap between the virtual and real worlds while highlighting Meta's commitment to offering cost-effective or free AI solutions that seamlessly integrate into daily life. Notably, Meta's Quest VR headset, already a bestseller in the emerging VR market, was praised by company executives as the industry's best value proposition, as it faces impending competition from Apple's higher-priced offering.

Speaking from the central courtyard of Meta's sprawling Silicon Valley campus during the Meta Connect conference, Zuckerberg announced that the next generation of Meta's Ray-Ban smart glasses would become available on October 17th, with a price tag of $299. These smart glasses incorporate a new Meta AI assistant and allow users to livestream their perspective directly to Facebook and Instagram, a significant improvement over the previous model's photo capture capabilities.

The Meta Connect conference was a momentous event for the social media giant, marking its largest gathering of the year and its first in-person conference since the onset of the pandemic.

Zuckerberg also revealed that the latest Quest mixed-reality headset would start shipping on October 10th, along with the introduction of Meta's first consumer-facing generative AI products. Among these is a chatbot named Meta AI, capable of generating both text responses and lifelike images.

Zuckerberg noted, "Sometimes we innovate by releasing something that's never been seen before. But sometimes we innovate by taking something that is awesome, but super expensive, and making it so it can be affordable for everyone or even free."

Meta AI will be integrated into the smart glasses as an assistant, initially undergoing a beta rollout in the United States. A planned software update for the following year will empower the assistant to recognize objects and locations in the user's field of view and perform language translations.

Meta developed Meta AI using a customized model based on the powerful Llama 2 large language model, which the company made available for commercial use in July. The chatbot will have access to real-time information through a partnership with Microsoft's Bing search engine, according to Zuckerberg.

In an interview, Meta Global Affairs President Nick Clegg clarified that the company has taken steps to filter out private information from the data used to train the model. It has also imposed restrictions on the generation of certain content, such as realistic images of public figures, demonstrating a commitment to privacy and responsible AI use.

Additionally, Meta announced its plans to create a platform that allows developers and ordinary users to build custom AI bots. These bots will have profiles on Instagram and Facebook and eventually serve as avatars in the metaverse. To showcase the tool's capabilities, Meta generated 28 chatbots with distinct personalities, modeled after celebrities like Charli D'Amelio, Snoop Dogg, and Tom Brady.

These features seem geared toward enhancing existing apps and devices rather than creating new revenue streams. Bob O'Donnell, chief analyst at TECHnalysis Research, commented, "I don't see monetization of AI products happening for Meta for quite some time, and I think it will end up being more indirect. They seem much more interested in helping develop a platform that other developers will use."

Furthermore, Zuckerberg revealed that Xbox cloud gaming will be available on Quest starting in December.

These announcements highlight Zuckerberg's strategic response to the recent shift in investor interest from augmented and virtual reality to artificial intelligence. Investors closely watched this event to assess potential app development opportunities for Meta's latest hardware and to gauge whether the company's substantial investments in the metaverse will eventually yield a profitable return.