Abstract:
Meta has unveiled its latest artificial intelligence model, Muse Wonder, calling it the most advanced option for powering digital assistants. But it's not free. To use the model, users of the Muse personal agent app need to sign up for a $20 or $100 monthly subscription. The launch highlights Meta's efforts to create new AI-derived revenue streams outside of its core online advertising business.
Meta AI head Alexandr Wang said in an interview Monday that the company developed Muse Wonder — codenamed Watermelon — to empower “personal and professional agents” so they don’t get frustrated with tasks like making dinner reservations and checking to see if tables are available.
“When you perform real-world tasks, you will encounter obstacles and various situations or setbacks will arise,” Wang said. "We specifically trained the model to try other methods instead of stalling and then checking back with the user at any time."
Meta said in a blog post that the latest model "provides our strongest safeguards yet" against "network abuse." Currently, these protections are only available with paid models.
After Meta launched this AI agent application last month, Muse quickly rose to the top of the Apple App Store. The app is free, while subscription plans are available for more use.
Wang said Meta's AI team has been monitoring Muse-related agent "incidents or issues" in order to understand and resolve issues. Some users complained on social media that the agent had unauthorized access to personal messages, which the company denied.
Meta is trying to better inform people on how to use the app to avoid certain problems, Wang said.
"I think there are certainly cases where users grant permissions for various communications and things like that early in the conversation and then forget about it," Wang said. He added that the company is educating users on such matters "to ensure that consumers can trust the product in the future."
Muse Wonder will also be available to coders who pay for access to the company's relevant Meta Model API. Wang said the service will be more expensive than a standard subscription because it's a "much larger model and at the cutting edge." Pricing will still be "significantly lower" than leading models from OpenAI and Anthropic, he said.
A more powerful variant of Meta's latest model, called Muse Wonder Full, will be available only to developers who sign up for the company's software engineering-focused Muse Code AI agent, with subscription plans priced at $50 or $200 per month.
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