Meta's adults-only Muse agent leans on a mascot a child advocate compares to a Teletubby

The first thing Muse asks a new user for is a date of birth. Meta says the typed birthday is only the first step. "We require everyone using the Muse app to provide their date of birth, we block people we detect may be under 18 from creating an account, and we do additional checks to help ensure people who say they're adults are actually over 18," spokesperson Daniel Roberts told WIRED ^[5]. He opened that response by calling the piece "a story in search of a story" ^[6].

Here is what the product team tells itself users want. Mona Sarantakos, vice president of product management at Meta Superintelligence Labs, co-wrote a launch post describing a design that leans into "delightful" elements and should feel less awkward than chatting with "a corporate logo or entity" ^[13]. Julian De Freitas, an associate professor of marketing at Harvard who studies AI companions, put the case in terms of trust. "These types of cute factors can make the product seem warm and less threatening," he said. "There's a high bar that they have to overcome here, because attitudes toward Meta are quite negative after the social addiction rulings" ^[11].

Here is what people actually do with it, as far as the reporting shows. Muse climbed to the top of the app charts on its ability to complete digital tasks ^[4]. Meta's chief AI officer, Alexandr Wang, posted nonstop memes of Jolly, some in suggestive situations ^[9]. WIRED's reporter, a 32-year-old man in San Francisco, wrote that the character draws him in as well ^[16].

The sources split on how far down the age range the appeal goes. "Oh my God, it looks like a Teletubby," said Josh Golin, an executive director at Fairplay, a nonprofit that previously lobbied against Meta's targeting of children. "People who study children's media understand that those rounded shapes particularly appeal to kids in the preschool age," he said ^[7]. Other specialists WIRED interviewed were less convinced the design was aimed at children and compared it to Japan's long history of marketing technology with adorable characters ^[8]. Meta did not say what its additional checks are or how many under-18s they have stopped ^[5].

For a team shipping an adults-only product with a friendly face, I'd put two measures on one grid before launch. One axis is appeal outside the permitted audience, measured in testing with under-18s and in the weekly count of sign-ups the gate blocks. The other is how the gate works, with a birth date the user types at one end and checks that confirm age at the other. Meta says Muse sits past the typed end ^[5]. High appeal to minors behind a self-typed gate is the square to leave, and there are two ways out. Changing the character gives up the warmth De Freitas describes with an audience that distrusts the company ^[11]. Adding verification puts an extra step in front of every adult who signs up.