Meta, the company formerly known as Facebook, is hellbent on making the metaverse happen. It’s still widely debated how it’ll be implemented, and many brands have jumped on board without any guarantee that it’s really the future. Nevertheless, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is soldiering on, and investing heaps of cash into building the metaverse.

First on the to-do list: build an AI voice assistant. Because all the cool kids have one…

Hey, Meta

During a presentation, Zuckerberg detailed the company’s plans to build a fully-functioning digital assistant. Not a typical one, however. One that can “move between virtual and physical worlds.” That’s not ominous at all.

Meta plans to offer an assistant that promises a ‘more immersive version of the internet’. It’ll allow users to interact via AR glasses in both virtual worlds and reality simultaneously. At least, in theory. The assistant is in the concept stage and is called “Project CAIRaok” internally. “When we have glasses on our faces, that will be the first time an AI system will be able to really see the world from our perspective — see what we see, hear what we hear and more,” Zuckerberg explains.

The company’s been offering its AR glass tech for a few years now. These make up part of its increased focus on hardware beyond just social media platforms, including the Facebook Portal smart display. The display currently features a type of assistant, able to act on basic commands, like setting a reminder or asking the weather. But the preferred assistant used on Portal devices is Amazon’s Alexa.

This week, Zuckerberg also showed off the company’s efforts in AI by demoing something called ‘Builder Bot’. This assistant allows the user to build a virtual world for the ‘metaverse’ using only voice commands. While Zuck and friends may find it impressive, it doesn’t look exceptionally appealing. Unless you like spending your time in 2D worlds, like an episode of Dora the Explorer, or maybe South Park.

Source: TechCentral