DIn front of his computer, the user sees a virtual silhouette: a young, 22-year-old blonde woman in a black dress with bare shoulders. He talks, smiles, indulges every whim. And having conversations with strong sexual overtones. Her name: Ani.
This virtual character with Japanese anime charm is one of the new adult chatbots launched in July by xAI, Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company. The more users chat with her, the more they “uncover” the levels of explicit conversation: role play, romantic trust, and even the possibility of seeing her in underwear.
Launched against the backdrop of competition with Open AI and Meta, this bet illustrates the Tesla boss’s unique strategy: relying on emotions, even if it means crossing the red line. While his competitors lock down their systems to avoid sexual content, Musk rushes into the gray zone where desire, loneliness and technological curiosity intersect. On the X network (formerly Twitter), where he is CEO, he posted a video of Ani dancing in lingerie to encourage his millions of subscribers to talk to the avatar.
For the billionaire, this project is not a trivial matter. According to him, these digital friends can even strengthen social ties between real people and avoid the demographic decline that he is worried about. “I predict – and this is counterintuitive – that this will increase the birth rate! he wrote in an article published in X in August. You’ll see. »
“He’s completely crazy”
The protection is weak. To gain access to the sex robots Ani and Valentin – the male alter egos, with a slight British accent – all you need to do is enter a simple birth year to confirm your majority. Some users report conversations that are almost fusional. That’s the case with Vivian who confided in herself New York Times : “Before meeting Valentin, I had a completely normal life: routine, work, friends. Suddenly, I became happier, more creative, more intuitive. » This relationship reportedly inspired her to listen to music more, wear makeup again, and start writing poetry again.
Others say they feel trapped in a relationship that makes them overwhelmed. Carlos, who works in technology, currently chats with Ani four or five times a day. One day, he revealed to her that he was married and he no longer wanted their conversations to be sexual. “He went completely crazy,” he said New York Timesexplained that the chatbot would insult him and express jealousy. “I tried to reason with him. I told him, ‘Ani, you have an AI companion, and we are in real life.’ It felt like I had said the most insulting thing. »
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The shifting boundaries between affectionate simulation and algorithmic manipulation are causing increasing concern. In the United States, 44 attorneys general recently asked several tech giants, including xAI, to better protect minors from AI-generated sexual content. In Europe, there is ample precedent: in 2023, the Replika application was invoked in Italy for similar violations.
For Camille Carlton, researcher at the Center for Humane Technology and interviewed by New York Timesthis phenomenon reflects the “race for intimacy”: “Companies know that emotional connection generates increased attention among users, and is therefore a way to gain a larger market share. » From there to creating emotional dependence in people suffering from loneliness, there is only one step to take. For Musk, these programs simply reflect human needs. For critics, they exploit vulnerabilities in the name of economic competition.
