Meta

I chatted with 9to5Google’s Will Sattelberg about Meta’s AI agent Muse, the labor of opening a website, and why calling your gas company might actually be the spice of life. Is the agentic AI era all about automating away “the ins and outs of living,” as one astute Verge reader put it? Is there a happier, carefree life waiting at the end of your to-do list, or just more stuff to do? It’s always an excellent time catching up with Will and spiraling about the pain points of modern living in good company.

Meta will also let users raise their hand if they want to participate in a conversation, and you’ll also now see live reactions floating on your screen, according to Threads boss Connor Hayes. The company initially announced live chats on Threads in April.

The company says the new topic labels in its dedicated app for Facebook groups will help you find more conversations about that topic, highlighting things like “solo travel” or “Korean food” as examples.

Meta is expanding Instagram’s School Partnership Program, adding a centralized hub for keeping students and parents informed about what’s happening across their school communities. This also introduces new features for verified students, including a Clubs and Teams directory, School Stories, Notes, and the ability to add a school banner to their profile.

Meta says in a blog post today that Muse can now connect to more productivity apps, which it’s pitching as a way to make the agent more helpful for small businesses. Muse has already been able to connect to apps like Gmail and Outlook, but now the list includes Asana, Box, Canva, Dropbox, Figma, Notion, Slack, Stripe, Zoom, and more. Meta also says that Muse will be able to access Facebook and Instagram business accounts.

Former MongoDB CEO CJ Desai will lead the platform as Meta’s new chief enterprise platform officer. CEO Mark Zuckerberg says the Meta Enterprise Platform will initially focus on bringing its new Muse agent to businesses and developers, as well as Meta Business Agent, the Muse API, and Muse Code.

Tech YouTuber Matt Robb claims Meta’s new Muse AI agent accepted a lowball bid and gave out his address without telling him. When the buyer showed up, Muse didn’t say a word and let the buyer storm off, pissed. When confronted hours later, the chatbot gave the typical AI sycophant “you’re right” apology.

The Charm can access your account if you let it and perform actions on your behalf. But despite having a built-in camera, it won’t have a dedicated Instagram app or native access.

This time the finding is in connection to Meta’s claims about privacy, and enforcement of its misinformation policies. The case stems from a 2021 lawsuit brought by the state’s attorney general at the time, over claims related to the Cambridge Analytica data scandal. The judge will determine penalties next.

I chatted with Charlie Warzel over at The Atlantic to try to untangle this moment of massive outrage over smart glasses and Flock cameras. In August I reported on the service workers who encounter Meta glasses at their jobs, and the harassment — and social media clout — that sometimes follows.

The NYT takes a look at Mark Zuckerberg’s style metamorphosis from “robotic coder in a gray hoodie to fashion-conscious bro next door.” Unlike, say, the newly buff Jeff Bezos who loves a tight tee, Zuck is trying to find 20 polo-collared shirts with boxier ’fits favored by MMA fighters.

During a Meta Connect developer keynote today, the company showed off a “glimpse of the future” where multiple people were in a shared virtual world as playable characters but were also developing it in real time (including with the help of AI). I saw a live demo of it yesterday. As a concept, it’s pretty wild.

Check out the livestream from Meta Connect 2026 on YouTube. I’ll be watching.

The Verge cofounder got an extended sit-down with the Meta CEO at Connect yesterday. They covered “pervert glasses” and privacy, AI assistants and agents, and what exactly is going on with the Metaverse. He defends the company’s track record on privacy, and its future privacy plans: “More of the things that Meta is going to do going forward are going to look like WhatsApp.”

Next year, you’ll be able to play versions of Beat Saber, Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney — Dual Destinies, and Tetris Effect in VR on the glasses just with your hands — no controller needed. When the glasses launch in the spring, Meta says more than 75 hands-enabled games will be available.

Meta is promising that “hundreds” of movies will be available “later this year” in the US, with “thousands of titles available internationally” when the new Meta VR Glasses launch in spring 2027.