“M” used to mean James Bond’s boss, just as “Q” meant his quartermaster, the electronic genius. Now “M” has a new definition. But will M put an end to auto correct madness? Or will we need a Q?

The gremlins that infect auto correct are one royal pain for people who text in a hurry. These errors in correction can be disastrous, subbing in a wrong word or term. Or in my case, a recent text was “corrected” to change a time for a meeting to “38th” for some ungodly reason.

The result was a nearly missed dinner.

Egad!

How many texts have you had to rewrite thanks to auto correct wisdom?

Now Facebook is promising a smarter messaging app with an update to Messenger. Called “M,” it’s an artificial intelligence powered solution. Let’s pray it’s truly smart.

Messenger’s “M” launched in 2015, and Facebook is promising that after testing “M” has demonstrated that gets smarter the more you use it.

“M Now Offers Suggestions to Make Your Messenger Experience More Useful, Seamless and Delightful”

That’s the promise Facebook makes.

Laurent Landowski and Kemal El Moujahid, Product Managers for Messenger, wrote in a blog post:

“M is your helpful assistant in Messenger, powered by artificial intelligence. M offers suggestions by popping into an open conversation to suggest relevant content and capabilities to enrich the way people communicate and get things done.”

They are promising a great deal.

“When we announced M over a year ago, it was a small AI experiment powered by humans that could fulfill almost any request.”

Oh really?

“We learned a lot and these interactions have enabled us to build a completely automated version of M that suggests helpful actions in your chat, exposing features people may not have known were available right in Messenger. Suggestions from M has been testing with a small percentage of users for the past few months — and it has been a great success — today we’re expanding it to all Messenger users in the US.”

Suggestions include:

  • Sending stickers: M shares fun sticker suggestions for your daily life interactions like “Thank you” or “Bye-bye.”
  • Paying or requesting money: M recognizes when people are discussing payments and gives them the option of easily sending or requesting money.
  • Sharing your location: M can suggest an option to share your location during a conversation.
  • Making plans: If people are talking about getting together, M helps coordinating a plan.
  • Starting a poll (in group conversations only): Have a hard time making decisions in a group? M lets you set a poll topic and vote in group conversations.
  • Getting a Ride: Talking about going somewhere? M suggests “Get A Ride” and shares an option of Lyft or Uber.

Will “M” work?

Or will we need a “Q” to fix its errors?

Read more at:

M Now Offers Suggestions to Make Your Messenger Experience More Useful, Seamless and Delightful