Meta is letting anyone in the U.S. create an AI version of themselves on Instagram and across the web with a new tool called AI Studio.
The pitch is that creators and business owners can use these AI profiles to converse on their behalf with their followers, speaking directly with humans in chat threads and replying to comments on the author’s account. Meta says that US Instagram users can get started with AI Studio by starting a new “AI Chat” through the company’s website or directly within Instagram.
“Creators can customize the AI based on their Instagram content, topics to avoid, links they want shared, and more,” the company wrote in a blog post on Monday. The post went on to say that creators will also be able to toggle things like auto-replies from the AI, and choose specific accounts the AI can interact with.
AI Studio also lets you create entirely new AI characters that can be deployed across Meta’s apps. In this respect, Meta follows in the footsteps of startups like Character.AI and Replika, which are already getting people to converse with and even love themed chatbots. Similar to OpenAI’s custom GPT store, Meta also lets people publish the AI characters they create for others to try out.
Meta’s first foray into this concept was to have several celebrities create AI versions of themselves that looked the same but had different names and personas. At the time, Meta said they took this approach because they were concerned that AI versions of celebrities would make problematic statements on behalf of humans. (Even with the controls built into AI Studio, this is bound to happen — we’re dealing with generative AI after all.)
Get ready for AI to pop up everywhere on Instagram. Meta
Meta, at least, seems to recognize that this is risky territory. The company says that AI profiles are clearly labeled everywhere they appear. The company’s creator handbook goes into more detail about the AI creation process, and it appears creators are responsible for listing topics that the AI won’t engage with. One example question Meta gives that you can tell the AI not to answer is “Should I invest in cryptocurrency?”
