Our Reporter Tried Meta’s Viral AI Agent. Should You?

Ryan Knutson (0:00)

Before we get into today's episode, we have some news. The Journal is coming to Dallas. On Monday, November 9th, I'll be on stage for a live show. We'll dig into a big story, bring in a special guest, and I promise it will be The Journal like you've never experienced it before.

There's a link to where you can buy tickets and our show notes. I'd love to see you there. All right, on to today's show.

If you've opened Facebook or Instagram or WhatsApp lately, you might have gotten a prompt to check out something new from Meta called Muse.

Nicole Nguyen (0:35)

There's a little promo message at the top of the feed that says, try Muse. It's an agent that can do stuff for you.

Ryan Knutson (0:43)

Our colleague Nicole Nguyen is a personal tech columnist, and she's been covering the rollout of this wildly popular new AI agent.

Nicole Nguyen (0:51)

Within days, Muse shot up to the top of the App Store and was downloaded millions of times. And last week at Meta headquarters, every announcement on stage was about Muse.

Mark Zuckerberg (1:09)

The centerpiece of our vision for what we're building is Muse.

Ryan Knutson (1:16)

On stage at a Meta Developer Conference, Mark Zuckerberg talked up the new product.

Mark Zuckerberg (1:21)

This is the personal agent that we shipped a few weeks ago, that it's already helping millions of people with all kinds of different things.

Ryan Knutson (1:31)

Muse is a chatbot that you can talk to like any other AI chatbot. But Muse can also do things on your behalf, like book your flight, manage your calendar, or respond to emails.

And for now, it's free.

Mark Zuckerberg (1:44)

In the coming years, I expect that Muse is going to grow into the personal superintelligence that billions of people around the world are going to use to accomplish their goals and improve their lives.

Nicole Nguyen (1:56)

Chatbt and Claude also have this capability.

But if you didn't know where to look, you'd never really find it. Like one of the settings that you are immediately faced with when you open Chatbt is which model do you want to use, and how much of it. And normal people are like, I don't know. And Muse doesn't have a setting like that. You know, you just chat with it like you would text a friend over WhatsApp.

Ryan Knutson (2:22)

This past week, Nicole took Muse for a spin herself.

Nicole Nguyen (2:26)

I tried Muse, and at first I was really hesitant to give it any data, and Muse kind of nudged me to like give it a little bit more. First it was like, give me your credit card, and then it was like, give me access to your calendar, and then it was like maybe you should connect your Gmail. And as I did connect more of that stuff, I found that it was magical and also a little creepy.

Ryan Knutson (2:52)

The rise of this technology raises a question. Do you really want AI taking control of your personal life? Welcome to The Journal, our show about money, business, and power. I'm Ryan Knutson. It's Wednesday, September 30th.

Coming up on the show, Meta's muse is taking AI agents mainstream. Is the world ready?

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