The AI hype machine has been shouting about agentic AI for ages. Now, it may been in reach for ordinary consumers. Or maybe not. Here’s my journey to agentic AI.
In the six months or so that my AI training business partner Anne Taylor and I spent in boardrooms training people in the basics of generative AI, we talked very little about agentic AI.
We said that it existed, that it was GenAI that could do things like book a holiday, that it was mostly being deployed in businesses by developers – in short that it was too complicated to be included in an introductory course.
That’s all changed.
In the last few weeks both Meta and OpenAI have brought much simpler versions of agentic AI to market – agents billed as so easy to use that perfectly ordinary members of the public could have their own agent.
Since one of the aims of this Sensible Guide series is to make AI more widely accessible, it is thus my duty to go and play with these tools. Also, it could be fun. So I tried.
Dear reader, it is of course not as simple as advertised. This is what I found.
Meta’s Muse
There’s a beautiful web page, complete with a video of Teletubby-like agents, all willing to do your bidding. The website promises to take the busywork off your plate: “Muse gets to know you and your goals, working across all aspects of life so you can focus on the things that matter. It comes with strong privacy and security built in, keeping you in control.”
So far, so good. I hit the “Try Muse” button in the top right hand corner and went through a log-in process (which seemed to make a new Meta account, rather than pulling my existing Facebook or Instagram credentials). I was asked for my birthday, apparently for safety reasons.
And then got this: “Muse isn’t available in your country or region yet. We’ll let you know when it’s available to you.”
I’ve joined the waitlist. So no musing for me yet.
OpenAI’s Dots
Another very pretty web page, with cute colourful little Minion-like creatures representing agents.
(Aside: interesting that both these cutting-edge tech products are made to look like children’s TV or movie characters. Does this mean the uber class of tech bros think we are all children?)
I hit the “Create your dot” button and got redirected to the ChatGPT browser interface, where I learned that I need the Pro account to get a little furry friend. Such an account costs R1839 a month.
That’s ridiculously expensive. No dot for me.
Gemini Spark (or is that Tasks?)
I then wondered in there’s a similar offering from Gemini (which I do pay for – I have Pro account, which costs about R400 a month). Some internet searching revealed that there’s something called Gemini Spark (though an article I saw later says that Google is yet again renaming things: “Google is moving Spark , its background agent, into the main chat as ‘Task’’”.)
Whatever it’s called, after some back and forth with Gemini, I established that it is hiding in plain sight below the prompt field – and not a cute little animal or cartoon character anywhere to be found:
I hit Task and got a pop-up with various disclaimers:
Then I set to work. The process is simple – you type what you want to do into the prompt. This is what I asked:
I want to check if the ISP I am using is the cheapest available. This is the product I have: Mweb Premium Uncapped 100/100Mbps Fibre Line – Vumatel. It costs R1059 pm. See if you can find a cheaper service that offers the same service.
Spark came up with several offerings, the cheapest of which was not all that much cheaper than my current product. So I asked this:
Are there any customer reviews for those cheaper services – I would only be saving R114, which might not be worth it if the service is worse than Mweb
Gemini named the cheapest, and said it had received decent reviews.
A new question occurred to me – so I asked it if we actually needed the premium, uncapped service (and gave it a year’s worth of data usage to analyse). Gemini came back with a good answer, which came down to understanding how many users there are in our household and what their usage patterns are. I won’t repeat the boring details, but what it came down to was the knowledge that it’s probably best to stick with our current offering.
So what’s the fuss about, then?
Of course, none of this is agentic work. I could have had this conversation in an ordinary prompt with an AI chat tool. And with the conclusion being that actually I didn’t want to change anything, the end result was that I didn’t actually need an agent. Still, I asked Gemini Spark what it would be able to do for me if I did want to proceed, and here’s what it offered:
Here is everything I can handle to make the transition smooth and ensure you don’t experience downtime:
- Draft your Mweb cancellation notice: I can write a formal cancellation email tailored to Mweb’s requirements—specifying your line release date, requesting confirmation in writing, and ensuring your Vumatel B-number (the unique identifier on your ONT box) is ready for transfer. If you use Gmail, I can even place it straight into your drafts folder.
- Map out your migration timeline: Because Mweb requires a calendar month’s notice, I can calculate the exact cutoff dates so you avoid paying double or losing connectivity (for example, serving notice before the end of October for a clean cutover on November 30).
- Guide your new ISP application: I can walk you through the migration signup steps for the new service – specifically helping you select an “ISP Migration / Transfer” rather than a new line installation so you don’t get billed for duplicate cabling.
- Schedule deadline reminders: I can add reminders to your Google Calendar for checking Mweb’s written cancellation acknowledgement and tracking the delivery of your new Wi-Fi router.
- Advise on hardware returns and handover: I can outline Mweb’s router return policy (to help you avoid non-return penalties) and guide you through connecting the new router to your Vumatel box once the line is released.
(Note: Because ISP signups and cancellations require personal South African RICA verification, proof of address, and direct banking/debit order authorization, you will just need to click “send” on the drafted cancellation and authorize the final signup with the new ISP yourself.)
All of that looked hella useful (though I am sure some of the detail might be off-kilter – for instance, I think we paid for the router ourselves, rather than getting one from Mweb). And those Gemini steps would no doubt have saved me time if I had wanted to change my ISP.
Final word
It does look as though access to an AI agent is now easier than it was (or will be). For me, the jury is still out on the question of how much of my personal information I am comfortable handing over to an AI tool, no matter how cute it is.
Main picture: Jamie Street, Unsplash
Previous Sensible Guide articles
Another day, another buzzword: an introduction to agentic AI – Just when we thought we had a grip on all things AI, something new heaves into view. Here’s your introduction to agentic AI.
Privacy and Generative AI – what you need to know – I’ve done some research on the question of privacy and Generative AI. My findings and thoughts…
The responsibility ladder and generative AI : who is in charge? – A way to think about responsibility that makes sense, both when working with generative AI and personally.
If any of this is relevant to your work…
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