Meta Platforms Inc (NASDAQ: META) has seen remarkable early success with its Muse AI personal assistant, capturing strong interest from both consumers and investors. Since its launch two weeks ago, the company's share price has climbed over 20%, and the app has soared to the top of Apple's App Store, surpassing ChatGPT. However, as Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg prepares to take the stage at the company's annual developer conference, Meta Connect, later this afternoon, there are legitimate reasons for skepticism regarding Meta's latest bid to carve out a meaningful and lasting presence in the consumer AI market.
Meta has been promoting Muse's capabilities to book appointments, arrange travel, fill out spreadsheets on behalf of users, and monitor home security cameras. It can also handle shopping tasks, searching for specific items across multiple websites and marketplaces, and connecting to Shopify or Stripe to complete payments. Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN) has already declared this approach unacceptable, blocking Muse from making purchases on its e-commerce app and citing violations of its terms of service. According to experts, whether other retailers follow suit out of concern over losing direct customer relationships, or whether consumers remain wary of trusting the Facebook parent company with sensitive data, the social media giant still has a significant journey ahead to convert Muse's early momentum into a successful product.
Joseph Turow, professor emeritus at the University of Pennsylvania and a digital media and privacy expert, said, "People will be highly cautious. Some will experiment tentatively, while others will only accept it from specific companies they trust." Turow noted that there will be "early adopters," and then others will be "lured in" upon seeing that using such personal assistants can save money by finding the best discounts.
Zuckerberg is pushing deeper into the AI agent space at a tense moment for both the AI industry and Meta itself. Anthropic and OpenAI are urging a slowdown in model development due to growing concerns that advanced AI is slipping beyond human control, potentially threatening humanity or at least amplifying cyberattacks if left unchecked. Meanwhile, Meta agreed last month to pay up to $17 billion to settle a multi-state lawsuit alleging the company misrepresented the extent of harm that Facebook and Instagram caused to children's mental health. The rise of generative AI and chatbots has made the issue of internet addiction more pressing, with both OpenAI and Google having been sued by plaintiffs alleging their technologies caused harm, including suicide.
Guarding Customer Relationships
Amazon has made it clear recently that it will not allow AI services to stand between the company and its customers. Last November, it sued Perplexity, accusing the startup of taking measures to "conceal" its AI agent to continue scraping the retailer's website without approval. Amazon has also blocked agent tools from OpenAI and Google. Matthew Hassett, CEO of Loftie, a smart alarm clock company selling on Amazon, and founder of AI e-commerce startup Deliberate, said, "Amazon's entire model is about strictly guarding customer relationships." He added, "'Respecting service providers' decisions' is a polite way of saying 'don't come onto our shelves.'" Hassett was referencing Amazon's statement, which said that "third-party applications acting on behalf of customers to purchase goods from other merchants should operate transparently and respect the service providers' decisions regarding participation."
Max Willens, an analyst at Emarketer, said that as more consumers use AI assistants like Muse, Amazon will place greater emphasis on protecting its role in the "consumer journey." "For years, Amazon has been the first stop for most American consumers when they want to buy something online," Willens said. "Now, these consumers are increasingly starting their shopping journeys through conversations with AI assistants."
Beyond commerce, Muse has raised concerns in other industries, as Meta's new assistant could take over powerful functions. Shares of financial services firms including Charles Schwab (NYSE: SCHW) and LPL Financial Holdings (NASDAQ: LPLA) fell sharply on Tuesday, while travel websites Booking Holdings (NASDAQ: BKNG) and Expedia (NASDAQ: EXPE) saw their stocks plunge on Wednesday.
For Meta, the early momentum of Muse has reignited optimism on Wall Street, following a year in which the stock lagged behind most mega-cap peers and the broader tech sector. With this post-launch rally, the stock is up 13% year-to-date in 2026, slightly below the Nasdaq's 16% gain. Cantor analysts, who recommend buying Meta shares, published a report on Tuesday titled "Meta is racing while AI is pacing." They noted that while the business model remains unclear for a company deriving nearly all of its revenue from digital advertising, the opportunity is evident. "We believe Muse's unit economics are subsidized in the early stages, but we think META has multiple paths to a profitable freemium model," the analysts wrote.
Analysts at Mizuho, who also hold an equivalent buy rating on the stock, suggested that Meta Connect comes at an opportune time to connect Muse with the company's AI narrative, particularly around wearables. While Meta's Quest-branded virtual reality headsets have failed to capture a large market, its smart glasses developed in partnership with EssilorLuxottica, the parent company of Ray-Ban, are seeing much higher adoption rates. "We expect Connect to advance Muse's story from app adoption to platform creation," Mizuho analysts wrote on Tuesday. "The likely headline is Muse on glasses, combining Meta's rapidly growing AI assistant with wearables to create what we believe is the clearest consumer AI use case to date."
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