Instagram parent company Meta will enable users to create their own AI-powered chatbots and add them to their profiles, an effort to court creators and further integrate the company’s AI software into its most popular consumer products.
The feature, dubbed AI Studio, enables creators with professional accounts to make a custom AI chatbot that is “an extension of themselves” and will be able to answer common questions from fans or followers. People can tell their chatbot what types of questions to answer, or which topics to avoid, the company wrote in a blog post.
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Instagram Users To Make Their Own AI Chatbots
Instagram users will be able to create a themed chatbot for their profile, for instance, a bot focused on mixed material arts, dining, or pets. Both features will be rolling out to a wider audience in the coming days.
Meta first announced AI Studio in September 2023. Now, that the company has started shipping the features for some users, the timing will coincide with Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg’s appearance alongside Nvidia Corp. CEO Jensen Huang at the ACM SIGGRAPH conference happening this week.
The company has been shelling out on AI in recent years, and Zuckerberg has been open about his expectations that the company will develop some of the best chatbots in the world. It already offers its own AI chatbot, dubbed Meta AI, inside Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp.
Meta launched its recent large language model, the technology used to power chatbots, earlier this month. That new model is capable of fixing complex math problems and analyzing entire books almost instantly and also allows users to generate new images of themselves in different scenarios using only a text prompt.
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Instagram To Soon Bring Expiring And Semiprivate Comments
Instagram has announced that it is expanding a temporary away status-like feature. Users will now be able to leave Notes on Reels and grid posts, where their comments will show up on top of the content in small bubbles.
Similar to Notes, these comments are temporary -- they’ll disappear after three days unless users delete them earlier. The new temporary comments are also semiprivate, and users can tailor who’s able to see their comments; either users’ curated list of close friends or followers they follow back.
As far as the screenshots are concerned, it also seems as though users will be able to tag each other in Notes on Reels and Posts. They’re basically hidden comments for a small audience.
When users encounter Reels and posts with Notes from Friends, those comments will show up almost like a sticker on top of the content. The feature is clearly meant to tap into the more private ways people interact with Instagram, like DMing with close ones. Being able to see what your friends are saying on the platform without having to scroll through comments could be a welcomed feature.