Instagram just dropped a game-changer for users located in the U.S – a generative AI-powered background editing tool. Ahmad Al-Dahle, the man behind the team of generative AI at Meta, spilled the beans on the new feature on Threads. According to his announcement, the tool will allow users to change their backgrounds in Stories using nifty prompts.
Al-Dahle posted an example of the feature to demonstrate the function of the tool. The process to use the tool is simple. Here’s the drill: When you click on the background editor icon, prompts like ‘chased by dinosaurs’ or ‘surrounded by puppies’ pop up on the screen, according to the post. This is not the end of the feature as the employment of generative AI for background editing allows users to input prompts of their own concoct the background according to their liking.
Once the background is set and shared with other users of the platform, a “Try it” sticker is shared along with the original prompt, acting like an invitation for other users to embrace the magic of generative AI and create innovative Stories.
This move by Instagram comes after Snapchat’s recent developments involving AI-generated images for users who are paying for an in-app service. As of recently, Snapchat has been at the top of its creative game and is dropping new features like hot potatoes. For instance, its recently launched feature Dreams allows users to turn themselves into fantasy heroes. Along with this, the platform also Snapchat+ users to try out prompt-based backgrounds – a feature that is similar to the one Instagram announced just yesterday.
Along with the generative AI announcement, Meta has also released new plans involving AI. They’ve released their squad of 28-AI powered characters across WhatsApp, Messenger and Instagram for users located in the United States. On top of that, Meta is boasting its AI developments with Imagine with Meta, an AI-image generator powered by their very own Emu model. The model has the ability to generate images in response to text prompts – a feature that other companies working with AI have also unveiled. For instance, Canva and OpenAI’s ChatGPT can generate images based on textual prompts.
To stay up to the trend and beat the competition, Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta is currently exploring the AI realm deeply and launching innovative updates. In September, it came to light that Meta utilised public posts on Facebook and Instagram to train parts of its Meta AI virtual assistant. It reported that the company excluded private posts for training to respect the privacy of the users of the platforms, according to a report by Reuters. This raised a few eyebrows, especially due to the company’s history with user data and respecting privacy.
Meta’s competition is also rampantly training their AI models to get first to the breakthrough. For instance, OpenAI signed a deal with Shutterstock for 6 years to use its extensive library of images, videos and music to train its AI models. These developments mark major developments in the world of AI and social media.
