Meta announced that Muse Voice, which allows users to place voice and video calls with its consumer AI agent Muse, is now available to everyone in the United States. The feature was first introduced at Meta’s Connect developer conference in September and relies on new models Meta calls Muse Realtime Avatar and Muse Realtime Voice.
Avatar interaction and customization
The system presents an animated avatar — referred to in some demos as “Jolly” — that can speak, use facial expressions and make gestures synchronized to conversation. Meta said users can customize the avatar’s appearance, choosing designs that resemble a person, an animal or another type of character.
Meta described the design choices as aimed at increasing a user’s sense of connection to the AI agent, and said the avatar will display “subtle expressions and gestures” that match the tone of the dialogue. Those descriptions and the rollout timeline were provided by the company.
Rollout and hardware plans
The company announced the expansion in a blog post and on X, where Meta’s chief AI officer, Alexandr Wang, shared a demo of his Muse. In the shared clip, Wang’s Muse — a fluffy white dog in the demo — suggested adding disclaimers to memes after Wang joked about posting them on X; Meta presented the exchange as an example of live interaction.
Meta said the real-time conversations are supported today on mobile devices, the web and Mac. The company also signaled plans to extend support to its AI Glasses and an upcoming hardware product called the “Muse Charm.” Meta additionally plans to ship a Tamagotchi-like wearable that will display the avatar on a small screen and allow voice interaction; the company indicated that device is expected before year-end.
Meta attributed feature details and device intentions to its own announcements and demonstrations.
Original source: TechCrunch AI