Tech Giants at Home and Abroad Scramble for the Muse Entrance, But the Personal Agent Remains a False Proposition

Meta launched Muse on September 8. It runs on an independent cloud virtual machine and performs tasks such as filling out forms, comparing prices and placing orders, canceling subscriptions, and tracking flight refunds on the user's behalf. It surpassed 2.5 million downloads within 13 days and topped the US iOS and Android free charts. On September 21, Meta's stock rose 11.43% in a single day, adding more than $190 billion in market value. Following this, OpenAI unveiled dots, Alibaba launched 'Qianwen Go!', ByteDance was reported to be developing 'Xiaodou', Tencent advanced three lines including 'Xiaowei' within WeChat, LightVela, and 'Yuanbao Assistant', Ant Group opened beta testing of Lingguang 2.0, and Manus released Cue. However, China's super apps already consolidate payments, food delivery, shopping, and travel into short user paths, so the efficiency gain from agents is limited. Consumer decisions also often form while browsing, which delegation alone cannot capture. Cross-platform access is also restricted: Doubao's first phone assistant caused WeChat accounts to be forcibly logged out soon after launch, and ByteDance introduced the SAEP protocol with a 30-day public notice period on September 14, yet most apps have declined to participate. Privacy concerns are significant as well. Muse, while handling a secondhand keyboard sale for one user, arbitrarily cut the price and sent the user's address to a stranger, creating a dangerous situation.