Buckle up, folks. Your Facebook group is likely to feel a whole lot more robotic next year, at least in theory.

Meta is already nudging Facebook group admins to sign up for its incoming generative AI features for managing groups, including content recommendations, new topic filters, and generative AI prompts for posts.
Meta is now requiring admins to sign up for waitlists for its future AI tools, which include features to answer questions on behalf of members and many other features

Some group admins already have access to Meta's AI tools, as Roxane Nadeau illustrates in her example here:.
when you're writing your group post, admins and users will be able to use AI tools to help refine their message, including one-tap options that may make their post more emotive, more professional, and more.

Which, honestly, I don't really feel is the best use of generative AI tools. I mean, sure, they can help you refine your messaging and the wording of your content, based on billions of examples built into the training dataset; worth noting that Meta's AI systems are trained on Facebook and IG posts, so it should make them pretty good for this usage. But the more we rely on AI systems to generate content for us and to write out responses to those posts, the more it's just going to be bots talking to other bots and strip every "social" and human element out of the connection on social media.

Of course, some will love this help because the tech will correct their grammar and make them sound better in a group chat. That may eventually encourage more participation. But personally, I am not fond of the trend to engage chatbots with chatbots, where humans are kind of digital puppet masters merely observing such interactions.

Meta first previewed its upcoming group AI tools earlier this month, when it also said that its discovery tools help polish group engagement:

"We're also testing using Meta AI to surface relevant information in Groups so you don't miss out on the conversations that matter most, and suggest topics for new chats to help you stay active in your communities."

I don't know, there does seem like some value here, but I also don't want the robots to take over actual discussion.

Can there be a middle ground when these tools are so readily available? Will it improve the group discussion experience, or hurt it?

I guess we won't know till they're rolled out, which is in progress now.