Before you hand over your inbox to an AI assistant, perhaps you’d like to meet a little guy.

His name is Jolly. He’s cute, cheerful-looking, and the default mascot for Meta’s Muse AI assistant. He also gives a friendly face to Meta’s much bigger ambition of making its AI part of your everyday life.

At Meta Connect on Sept. 23, Mark Zuckerberg showed off Muse and introduced Muse Charm, a Tamagotchi-like handheld device for interacting with the assistant on the go. With Jolly as its default avatar, it makes the idea of carrying around an AI assistant feel a little more like bringing along a tiny companion.

Giving a product a cute face is a familiar move. Duolingo has an owl whose antics you can follow without ever finishing a Spanish lesson. LINE’s sticker characters became a brand people buy plush toys from. And Microsoft’s Clippy is still recognizable to anyone who remembers trying to get him to leave them alone. (Interestingly, Microsoft recently killed its newest mascot, Pico.)

Before Jolly settles onto anyone’s keychain, meet the other mascots that show what a little character can do for a big company.

You don’t have to be learning Spanish to know who Duo is. The green owl is the mascot of language-learning app Duolingo, where he encourages you to keep up with your lessons. But on social media, he’s better known for memes, petty feuds, and a willingness to make absolutely everything his business.

Duolingo has given its mascot plenty to do beyond reminding people to study.

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