‘M’ will sit inside of messenger and will be able to complete tasks for users
Importance: For users of Facebook messenger and advertisers interested in future ad options.
Recommended link: Facebook launches M, its bold answer to Siri and Cortana
Digital Personal assistants seem to be all the rage at the moment. Apple led the way with Siri, Microsoft caught up fast with Cortana and Goole is also making big advances in AI technology with Google now. Not to be outdone, Facebook have announced their offering, a personal assistant called ‘M’ which sits inside it’s messenger app. Facebook announced this two days ago, on Facebook (funnily enough!)
Two things make M extremely interesting; that it is not ‘pure AI’ but rather AI that is trained by people, and that it will be able to complete tasks for users, like purchasing items.
Supervised AI
‘M’ is attempting to outdo other personal assistant providers by using people and AI in tandem. This was enabled by Facebook’s acquisition of Wit.ai at the start of this year. This means that human "trainers" will work with the AI to determine what needs to be done to answer your queries or accomplish the tasks you've set. A statement by Cade Metz from weird shows what this means in practice:
“The AI can do most of the work for simpler tasks, like telling a joke. It'll query an Internet joke API — a service that supplies jokes—and a trainer will approve the joke if it's funny. For more complicated tasks, such as making a driving test appointment at the DMV, the humans will do most of the heavy lifting. They'll actually place a call to the DMV”
This sounds like humans are currently actually providing a lot of the functionality, so it probably won’t be being rolled out to all messenger users any time soon. If Facebook let all 700 million of its messenger users have access it would need to hire a multitude of people to help answer queries! The success of M will hinge on the AI’s ability to learn from its human supervisors and thus allow Facebook to roll out the assistant without having to hire a prohibitively expensive number of people. It is interesting however that whilst Google and Apple were bogged down in the tricky task of creating pure artificial intelligence, Facebook has managed to bye-pass the issue and created an assistant that can do more with far less time spent in R&D. If it works it will have profound consequences.
Monetising messenger
Facebook has thus far avoided putting ads into its messenger platform, so right now it isn’t generating any video from its 700,000 million users. The fact that M will be able to make purchases for users opens the door to monetisation without having to introduce ads, which could drive users to other messenger aps. Facebook could partner with certain vendors, earning a cut whenever someone is referred to them by certain request. It could develop a system somewhat akin to Google ad words, where firms could pay to be more likely to come up in the assistant's answers. For example someone asking M where they should rent a car from in Austin, Texas, could be given the answer of a car rental firm, which is paying Facebook for the privilege.
That is just one way to monetise messenger, and Facebook may well opt for something different. It’s worth remembering that Facebook messenger could always run at a loss and still be a good investment, because it keeps users tied into the Facebook eco-system, and thus they will continue to return to the engine of Facebook’s revenue generation: the newsfeed.
Whichever way Facebook decide to take messenger, this latest announcement puts Facebook firmly in the saddle when it comes to instant messaging, and M may well help them to solidify their market dominance.
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