Facebook’s M is a Siri-like personal assistant for Messenger

It’s powered by artificial intelligence that’s trained and supervised by people.”Previous rumors indicated there would be a human component to Facebook’s approach”. “Unlike other AI-based services in the market, M can actually complete tasks on your behalf”, Marcus said in a Facebook post Wednesday. The software was debuted today under the name “M”, and will be available in a very limited release to users in the Bay Area starting today.

Now in testing, M also helps users send shipments and book appointments.

Messenger has tripled its users to over 700 million during Marcus’ tenure.

Furthering Facebook’s quest to manage every aspect of your life from remembering acquaintances’ birthdays right down to comparing your relative life success against the rest of your high school graduating class, they’re now joining Siri, Cortana, and Google Now in the realm of AI assistants.

“The AI tries to do everything”, Alex Lebrun, the founder of a startup Facebook picked up to help build M, told Wired. Better to get people excited about a toy they have to wait for than to force something that doesn’t work as well as people expect (obligatory Louis CK reference) into their hands.

Although Facebook is at a slight disadvantage since it’s not baked into an operating system the way Siri is in iOS and Google Now is in Android, the company believes it can become a powerful tool for helping Facebook users buy products they want more easily. Meet M, whose company you will undoubtedly enjoy for the 20 minutes it takes you to realize Googling things is still easier.

But the artificial intelligence at play seems significant, with M responding to your initial queries with follow-up questions and updates as tasks move towards completion.

For now, “M” is only available for a few select SF testers and there’s no timeline yet for its wider rollout.

While Google and Apple were caught up in the pure science of artificial intelligence, Facebook chose to brute force the development of a personal assistant with bunch of human helpers.