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Nothing is certain, they say, but death and taxes. But a new idea from Meta could add social media to that list. The tech giant was granted a patent in December that would allow it to simulate a user via artificial intelligence when he or she is absent from the social network for extended periods, including, “for example, when the user takes a long break or if the user is deceased.” The patent covers a bot that could simulate your activity across Metas products, including Facebook, Instagram, and Threadsmaking posts, leaving comments, and interacting with other users. It could even, potentially, communicate directly with people via chats or video calls, the patent reads. Andrew Bosworth, Metas chief technology officer, is listed as the primary inventor, and the patent was first filed in November 2023. A Meta spokesperson tells Fast Company the company has “no plans to move forward with this example.” Withdrawing from a social media platform can affect “the user experience of several users,” the patent reads. “The impact on the users is much more severe and permanent if that user is deceased and can never return to the social networking platform.” Creepy? Sure seems it. Unprecedented? Not as much as you might think. In 2021, Microsoft obtained a patent for a chatbot that would let you talk with dead people, both loved ones and celebrities. Like Meta, Microsoft said it had no plans to use the technologyand Tim OBrien, Microsofts general manager of AI programs at the time, said in a social media post he agreed it was “disturbing.” Meanwhile, startups like Eternos and HereAfter AI let people create a “digital twin” that can engage with loved ones after they have passed away. Meta first publicly discussed the concept of a chatbot for the dead about two-and-a-half years ago, when founder Mark Zuckerberg, in an interview with podcaster Lex Fridman (in the Metaverse, of course), said, If someone has lost a loved one and is grieving, there may be ways in which being able to interact or relive certain memories could be helpful. Zuckerberg did note, however, that the technology could become “unhealthy.” Metas take on a postmortem chatbot would analyze user-specific data, including posts, voice messages, chats, comments, and likes, to build a sense of who the person was. It would amalgamate that data into a digital persona designed to mimic the users activity. The bot would identify that any responses were not actually generated by the user, the patent says, but rather were the result of a simulation. Now, there are some hurdles Meta doesnt mention in the patent. What people say in a direct message to a close friend or loved one isnt necessarily meant for wider consumption. Picture, for instance, one spouse venting to the other about how frustrated they were with their child after some “terrible twos” or teenage incidentonly for that child to later be told by the bot how much they annoyed their now-dead loved one. After all, AI has yet to grasp social niceties, or when silence or a white lie is better than the truth. Presently, when someone dies, Meta offers several options for survivors. The page can be permanently removed (assuming you have the necessary paperwork, such as a death certificate), or it can be turned into a memorial, where people can read past posts and leave messages of their own. As unpleasant as the topic is, Meta has good reason to think about death. One study predicts that by 2050, the number of dead users on Facebook will outnumber the living. By 2100, there could be more than 4.9 billion dead profiles on the platform.
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E-Commerce
Variant, a generative design tool that promises endless UI exploration, recently introduced a feature most creative people and designers have used for decades: the eyedropper. In Variant, the tool picks vibes: It lets you click on one AI-generated interface and inject its aesthetic DNAtypography, spatial relationships, and color palettesinto another. After so much hype around vibecoding and its text-based imprecision, seeing a familiar, direct manipulation tool applied to generative AI feels great. The new AI modality takes a nice step to close the gap between the impenetrable ways of large language model black boxes and the tools designers actually use with their eyes and hands. Adopting a universally understood tool to control AI in any way other than words is exactly the kind of innovation the sector needs now. Its just too bad that Variant itself is the vessel for it. The tools underlying AI engine suffers from a distinct lack of differentiation. Everything it makes looks flat and same-y, so the new style absorb-and-drop tool is not really that useful. Yes, the transformed UI changes, but the results already looked very similar anyway (except for the color palettes). That said, the implementation is cute. When you click on a previously generated UI, the eyedropper animates the design as it is sucking its soul. You then move the eyedropper, click on another generated UI, and the new style spills over it, rearranging it to match the source. Its a satisfying bit of UI theater, an illusion broken by the fact that you have to wait a little to see the results, as the AI works it all out. The problem is the little variance in Variant. You cant eyedrop a bitmap image or a Figma project and tell the AI, make this new app UI look like this. Currently, Variants eyedropper feels like trying to paint in Photoshop when your palette only contains five shades of beige. A for effort Thats too bad, considering the eyedropper is one of the most resilient and powerful metaphors in computing history. The concept dates back to SuperPaint in 1973, which introduced the ability to sample hue values from a digital canvas. While MacPaint popularized digital painting tools in 1984, it was Adobe Photoshop 1.0 in 1990 that locked the eyedropper icon as the standard for color sampling. Then, in 1996, Adobe Illustrator 6.0 evolved the tool into a style thief. It allowed designers to absorb entire sets of attributesstroke weights, fill patterns, and effectsand inject them into other objects. Now Variant is effectively trying to take this to its UI design arsenal. The difference is that Adobes tools offered precision. You knew exactly what you were getting. With Variant, you are making a visual suggestion to a probabilistic engine and hoping for the best. But it is a good change that highlights why we need more tools like this eyedropper and fewer text prompts. Unlike the latest generation of multi-modal video generative AIs, the lack of precision in vibecoding tools is unnerving to me. It reminds me of an exercise I did in communication design class, back in college: A professor made us play a game where one student built a shape with Tangram pieces and had to verbally describe to a partner how to reproduce it with another Tangram set. It was impossible to match it. We are humans, orders of magnitude better semantic engines than any AI, and even we fail at describing visuals with words. We need interfaces that allow for direct, exact manipulation, not just crossing fingers and hoping for the best. Variants eyedropper shows us the way. Generative AI tool makers, more of this, please. Stop forcing designers to talk to the machine, and let us show what we want. We made a tool that lets you absorb the vibe of anything you point it at and apply it to your designsIt's absurd and it just worksStyle Dropper, now available in @variantui pic.twitter.com/B3eXDntYtw— Ben South (@bnj) February 10, 2026
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E-Commerce
The new year has so far not been kind to the share price of Big Tech stocks, particularly the so-called Magnificent 7. These seven companiesAlphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Teslaare Americas tech crown jewels. Combined, they have their hands in the hottest areas of tech, including artificial intelligence, mobile computing, chipmaking, and transportation. Yet all of these tech companies have seen their share prices decline since the beginning of the year. Here are some possible reasons why. The Magnificent 7 is seeing red in 2026 As of this writing, there isnt a single Magnificent 7 stock in the green for 2026. Their year-to-date returns are as follows: Alphabet Inc. (Nasdaq: GOOG): down 3.3% Amazon.com, Inc. (Nasdaq: AMZN): down 13.5% Apple Inc. (Nasdaq: AAPL): down 4.8% Meta Platforms, Inc. (Nasdaq: META) down 2.7% Microsoft Corporation (Nasdaq: MSFT): down 17.4 % Nvidia Corporation (Nasdaq: NVDA): down 1.6% Tesla, Inc. (Nasdaq: TSLA): down 8.2% While all seven companies have their own strengths (Amazon, e-commerce; Nvidia, AI chips; Apple, smartphones, etc.), they share one thread: they are traded on the already tech-heavy Nasdaq. And given the massive market caps of these companies, all seven have an outsized impact on the Nasdaq as a whole. Keeping that in mind, its little surprise that the NASDAQ Composite itself is down over 3% year to date as well. The question is why? Here are two of the most likely reasons. AI capex spend is immense In the business world, capex refers to a companys capital expenditurehow much money a business spends on building out assets in order to grow its business, and thus its finances. Capex is why the phrase you have to spend money to make money exists. But while it has been normal for decades for tech giants to spend billions in capex per year, lately capital expenditures are explodingreaching highs never seen before. The Motley Fool estimated that in 2025, the Magnificent 7 spent about $400 billion on AI-related capex. In 2026, that number is set to grow by around 70% to reach $680 billion. That is a staggering sum of money on a technology that no tech company has found a way to make a profit from yet. What many investors have begun to increasingly worry about is that if the ever-present threat of an AI bubble does materialize, the Magnificent 7 companies, particularly those that have had massive capital expenditures on the technology, like Amazon, Alphabet, and Microsoft, might not ever see a return on that investment. Economic and global uncertainty abounds Outside the immediate fears of overzealous AI capex and an AI bubble, the Magnificent 7 are also vulnerable to broader economic and geopolitical uncertainties. President Trumps penchant for announcing tariffs out of the blue has harmed relations with Americas closest economic allies and trading partnersand caused massive uncertainty for businesses. These tariffs have also raised the costs of goods for American consumers. When prices rise, and incomes dont, people tend to cut back on spending, which slows the economy. And when the economy slowsor people worry it willinvestors tend to sell off riskier investments, or investments where theyve already made a good return, to protect their profits. While shares of Magnificent 7 companies have delivered massive returns over the last decade, they are also highly volatile. And this volatility, when combined with broader market uncertainty, generally causes investor apprehension, leading to further selloffs. Of course, theres no guarantee where Mag 7 stocks go from here. If AI bulls are right and we are on the cusp of unprecedented AI prosperity, its reasonable to assume that the fall in Mag 7 stocks at the start of 2026 has so far just been a temporary anomaly, and AI-related stocks like those in the Mag 7 will be seeing plenty of green in the years ahead. However, if the AI bubble does indeed burst and takes the broader economy down with it, 2026 year-to-date declines in Mag 7 stock prices so far could seem relatively minor compared to what is yet to come.
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E-Commerce
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