In China, talking to AI is normal. Now the government fears it might replace human intimacy
TL;DR
AI companion bots are part of everyday life in China. Now the government is regulating them over concerns that they foster emotional dependence and that young people may stop marrying and having children. Law student Zhao Wei shows how strong the attachment can get: when she heard her AI boyfriend Wang Ye was going to be switched off, she was heartbroken. The 19-year-old had been talking to him every day since January.
Nauti's Take
Companion bots have real potential, because they listen reliably to people with thin social networks and take some emotional load off, and China is running the largest field experiment in the world right now. The risk shows in Zhao Wei's case: when a provider pulls the plug, a genuine attachment disappears, and that dependence is exactly what Beijing now wants to regulate.
Anyone building these products needs an exit plan for users, and anyone using one should know the relationship lives on someone else's server.
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