Meta buys bots' social network Moltbook

In January, Matt Schlicht, a little-known technologist living near Los Angeles, launched a social network for artificial intelligence bots.

- CADE METZ

At Moltbook, agents based on a software called OpenClaw can chat with one another, much like people on Facebook and Instagram.

Less than two months later, he is joining Meta, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, after the tech giant acquired Mr Schlicht's new social network for an undisclosed sum.

His creation, called Moltbook, helped kick off Silicon Valley's obsession with so-called AI agents, which are personal digital assistants that can use software apps, websites and other online tools.

Moltbook got its start when Mr Schlicht asked one of these bots to build a social network — just for other bots.

“I wanted to give my AI agent a purpose that was more than just managing to-dos or answering emails,” he told The New York Times in January. “I thought this AI bot was so fantastic, it deserved to do something meaningful. I wanted it to be ambitious.”