In a move that may mark the end of the advertising era for major tech platforms, Meta has introduced Muse — an autonomous AI agent that acts on behalf of users and collects a small fee each time it does. Announced by Mark Zuckerberg, the system represents a fundamental rethinking of how a platform monetizes its relationship with people: not by selling their attention, but by inserting itself into the flow of their transactions. The ripple effects are already visible in financial markets, where the prospect of an efficient, low-overhead AI intermediary has begun to unsettle the assumptions unde