Meta says that it is rolling out improvements to Meta AI, its cross-platform chatbot, including the ability have the bot “remember” details from conversations.
In a post on Meta’s official blog, the company said that, in chats with Meta AI on Facebook, Messenger, and WhatsApp for iOS and Android in the U.S. and Canada, users can now tell Meta AI to remember certain things about them, like that they love to travel and learn new languages.
The memory feature, similar to the memory features for OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini, lets Meta AI pick up on “important details” based on context, according to Meta. For example, if a user mentioned in a previous chat that they’re vegan and asks Meta AI for breakfast ideas, the chatbot will consistently factor in that dietary preference.
Meta says that Meta AI won’t remember things in group chats, and that users can delete its memories at any time.
In another, perhaps more controversial upgrade to Meta AI, Meta says that the chatbot will now use account info from across Meta’s apps to give personalized recommendations. That info might include the home location on a user’s Facebook profile, or recently viewed Instagram videos.
Here’s how Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg pitched it in a post on Monday:
“Meta AI will start to give you answers based on what preferences and information you’ve shared,” he wrote. “For example, it’s helped me come up with creative bedtime stories for my daughters, so if I ask it for a new one, it remembers they love mermaids.”
Personalized recommendations will go live on Facebook, Messenger, and Instagram in the U.S. and Canada to start. There won’t be an option to opt out, a Meta spokesperson told TechCrunch.
Meta is trying its darndest to give Meta AI’s newfound info-scraping abilities a positive spin. But given how little people trust Meta — and Facebook in particular — with their data, one wonders how the updates will be received.