Meta, the parent company behind Facebook, Instagram, and Threads, is reportedly developing a series of AI-powered chatbots with different personas. According to the Financial Times, these chatbots will include personalities such as an Abraham Lincoln imitator and a surfer impersonator. The aim of releasing these chatbots is to improve user retention, as Meta’s social platform, Threads, has been losing over half of its users. The chatbots could potentially compete with ChatGPT, Bing, and Bard, and may be launched as early as September.
Last year, OpenAI introduced ChatGPT, a chatbot that sparked a generative AI trend in the tech industry. Following suit, Microsoft and Google released their own AI chatbots, and numerous other AI startups have followed suit. Apple is also said to be working on its own chatbot. The development of Meta’s AI chatbots coincides with its efforts to maintain user engagement on Threads, a social media app linked to Instagram that was launched last month as a competitor to Twitter.
Meta recently unveiled a commercial version of Llama 2, its proprietary open-source large language model (LLM), after rumors of a widespread launch. Llama 2 consists of LLMs in three sizes: 7, 13, and 70 billion parameters, with larger parameters indicating a more powerful model. An LLM functions similarly to the brain of an AI chatbot, utilizing deep learning techniques to process massive amounts of data. The number of parameters determines the model’s size, and these parameters are measured by weights and biases that define the connections between words and their definitions, as well as the rules for using words in context.
With the foundation already in place, Meta appears to be on track to launch a successful lineup of AI chatbots in the coming months. The introduction of these chatbots could potentially revolutionize the way users interact with AI and enhance user experiences on Meta’s platforms.
