In a total plot twist, Meta and Apple—who are usually busy throwing shade at each other—have decided to collaborate. Today, Meta dropped Muse Spark Open, which they are calling the most capable open-weight AI model in the U.S. so far.
The tech deets
This model is a beast. We’re talking 816 billion parameters. Meta claims it’s a “natively multimodal model,” meaning it’s lowkey cracked at complex software engineering, long-horizon tasks, and multi-step reasoning. But the real headline here isn't just the stats; it’s the fact that it can actually run on your desktop. Specifically, you’ll need two Apple M5 Ultra Mac Studios using Apple’s MLX framework to get it running.
Why are they chilling?
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg gave Apple a shoutout on X, and new Apple CEO John Ternus replied with congrats, hyping up how the Mac Studio is pushing boundaries for on-device AI. Meta chief AI officer Alexandr Wang even told Axios, “We’re excited for mommy and daddy to be playing nice again,” admitting the two companies have been grinding on this collaboration for months. Apple also dropped a fresh technical post explaining how their MLX framework makes this hardware-level optimization possible.
Why it matters
Real talk, this is a big deal for on-device AI. Usually, models this massive require cloud-based supercomputers. By getting this to run on Mac hardware, they’re proving that local compute might actually be the future for high-level AI tasks, keeping your data from needing to hit the cloud constantly. It’s giving accessibility, and honestly, seeing these two tech giants collaborate is the kind of energy the industry needs right now.
