According to Meta'a AI Studio's manual, users can customize a chatbot by providing a detailed description, along with a name and image, and then specifying how it should respond to specific inputs. Llama will then use those instructions to improvise its responses. Meta says that Instagram users will be able to “customize their AI based on things like their Instagram content, topics they want to avoid, and links they want to share.”
Over the past year, Meta has become an AI success story thanks to its decision to offer robust AI models for free. Last week, the company released a powerful version of its large language model, Llama, giving developers, researchers, and startups free access to a model similar to the powerful paid model behind OpenAI’s ChatGPT. The company says its new chatbots are all based on the latest version of Llama.
And yet, Meta has struggled to find the right tone and niche for its own AI offerings. Last September, the company launched a series of AI chatbots loosely based on real-life celebrities. These included a fantasy roleplay dungeon master bot based on Snoop Dogg; a wisecracking sports bot based on Tom Brady; and an everyday companion inspired by Kendall Jenner.
However, these bots were not big hits and Meta retired them. Jon Carvill, a spokesman for Meta, said the company had learned from its early experiments. “AI Studio is an evolution,” he said.
There’s plenty of evidence that users find fully customizable bots more appealing. A company called Character AI, founded by several ex-Google employees who helped make breakthroughs in AI, has attracted millions of users to its own custom chatbots.
Zuckerberg also touted other new open-source AI developments from Meta at SIGGRAPH. The company has developed a new tool for identifying the content of images and videos, called Segment Anything Model (SAM) 2. The previous version is widely used for image analysis. Meta says SAM 2 can be used to analyze the content of videos more efficiently, for example. Zuckerberg showed off the technology that tracks cattle roaming his ranch on Kauai. “Scientists use this stuff to study coral reefs and natural habitats and the evolution of landscapes,” he told Huang.
Earlier in the day, in an onstage interview with WIRED’s Lauren Goode, Huang, the CEO of NVIDIA, said he’d “absolutely” like to have a “Jensen AI” that knows everything he’s ever said, written and done. “You can command it and hopefully it will say something smart,” he said. He could force stock analysts to pepper the bot—instead of him—with questions about the company. “That’s the first thing that has to go,” he said, laughing.
