The news of the launch of Meta’s personas comes at a time when the tech giant is struggling to retain users on its newly launched, Twitter-like application Threads.
American tech major Meta is reportedly preparing to soon launch artificial intelligence-powered chatbots that will exhibit different personalities, in an attempt to boost engagement with its social media platforms. The parent company of various leading social media platforms including the recently launched Twitter-like text-based app Threads could launch the chatbots as soon as September, the Financial Times reported.
Prototypes for chatbots that can have humanlike discussions with their users have been designed by Meta, the report noted. Dubbed “personas,” these AI chatbots take the form of different characters. The parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp is also reportedly exploring launching a chatbot that speaks like Abraham Lincoln and another and advises on travel options in the style of a surfer. Apart from being a fun product for people to play with, the purpose of these AI-powered chatbots will be to provide a new search function and offer recommendations.
Meanwhile, the Menlo Park, California-based social media giant has been heavily investing in generative AI and recently launched Llama 2, a next-generation language model that has the potential to power chatbots and other applications. Unlike its predecessor, Llama 2 is intended for both commercial and research purposes. Meta has taken an open-source approach to the development of Llama 2 and has partnered with Microsoft for its distribution.
The news of the launch of Meta’s personas comes at a time when the tech giant is struggling to retain users on its newly launched, Twitter-like application Threads. The platform managed to achieve one-fifth of Twitter’s weekly user database and an astonishing 86 times the active user base of Donald Trump’s TruthSocial by reaching 1 million active in just a week of its launch in early July.
However, the company lost more than half of its users in the weeks following its launch, and since then implementing various updates in order to boost retention in its platform. Late last month, Meta was reported to have been working on implementing “retention-driving hooks” for Threads. Instagram head Adam Mosseri said last week that Meta’s new microblogging service is set to receive direct messages, or DMs, support shortly.
