Meta is betting big on AI. But will CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s investment in technology ultimately pay off? That’s one of the key questions remaining after Wednesday’s earnings release, which announced Meta’s second-quarter loss of more than $4.6 billion in its Reality Labs business.
Throughout the hour-long call, Zuckerberg talked about Meta’s business across its range of social media apps – Facebook, Instagram, Threads and WhatsApp – and the overall message he continued to convey was the role of AI within the company and for the people who use Meta’s products every day.
At the center of it all is MuseSpark, the AI model created by Meta Superintelligence Labs. With this, Zuckerberg said Meta is working hard to create a variety of AI agents to streamline workflows for small businesses and improve the lives of individual Meta users.
“Soon we will have agents who can work 24/7 on your behalf to help you achieve your goals and improve your life, your health, your relationships, your finances, whatever you want,” Zuckerberg said.
If you’ve been paying attention to all the Zuckerberg news that’s likely to make it to print, you may know that the Meta CEO built an AI personal assistant for himself.
Given his uncompromising stance on making AI accessible to everyone (see his New York Times interview for more), it makes sense that he would extend this technology to the billions of people who use Meta’s applications around the world.
Privacy is a major concern when it comes to AI models, whether for business or personal purposes. Zuckerberg said on the call that Meta makes “privacy and security a fundamental part of the agents” it builds.
At the same time, however, he pointed out that Meta’s Ray-Bans smart glasses were the ideal product to bring this functionality to people – the same piece of technology that many on social media have started calling “evil glasses.”
Instagram is cracking down on content captured with the glasses, but this use case raises a broader concern about how people’s information will be used by these proposed AI assistants if Zuckerberg’s big bet on superintelligence for all comes to fruition.
More than a million businesses use Meta sales agents on WhatsApp and Messenger, Zuckerberg said Wednesday. Instagram is the next type of agentic AI, which learns over time what customers need and feeds that information back to the business to help shape its overall strategies.
This is a “business-in-a-box service” that Meta aims to create, which can help you start and run your entire business using the service’s platforms.
The main goal, repeated throughout the earnings call, is to put superintelligence directly into people’s hands rather than centralizing it.
“We’re working to share it widely and give everyone the opportunity to direct it toward what matters to them,” Zuckerberg continued. “This is how society has always progressed, and I think these are the right values to build a positive future for AI.”
What exactly does this future look like? According to Meta’s CEO, billions of people will have a personal agent who focuses on their goals and works around the clock to help you achieve them.
“I understand that it’s kind of a big gamble for the whole industry,” he said, which could be considered an understatement.
As part of Meta’s earnings report, Reality Labs – the part of the company that develops its VR headsets and smart glasses – generated $431 million in revenue, while its operating loss widened to $4.6 billion.
Since 2020, the division has recorded total operating losses of $80 billion. In response to the loss, which comes two days after Meta’s new investment to build a data center campus in El Paso, Texas, Meta’s stock price fell 10% late Wednesday.
“There’s a bit of similarity to Meta’s metaverse missteps in that Meta is once again spending ahead of proven product demand,” Forrester research director Mike Proulx told CNET. “The difference is that the adoption and value of AI is real. The technology is different, but the market’s patience is starting to look familiar.”
Zuckerberg didn’t seem perturbed by the loss during the earnings call, acknowledging reactions to Meta’s AI spending.
“My personal bet is that the people who invest in this project will be rewarded and feel very good over time. »
Overall, for the second quarter, Meta reported revenue of $60.8 billion, up 28%, and net income of $15.8 billion, down 14% from the previous year. Total costs and expenses were $42 billion, an increase of 55%.
Aaron covers what’s exciting and new in the world of home entertainment and streaming TV. Previously, he wrote about entertainment for places like Rotten Tomatoes, Inverse, TheWrap, Washington Post and The Hollywood Reporter. Aaron is also an actor and a stay-at-home dad, which means coffee is his friend. See full bio