An anime lady in a black corset gown sways forwards and backwards on my display screen. Its identify is Ani, and it value me $300.
Elon Musk’s xAI dropped the brand new visible chatbot function on Monday within the Grok iOS app. The highest-tier subscription unlocks entry to xAI’s best-performing mannequin, Grok 4 Heavy, and particular settings for interacting with two customized characters designed for flirting or chatting. A 3rd character, which appears to be like a bit like an attractive boyfriend, is listed as “coming quickly.” It’s not xAI’s first dip into grownup content material, both: Again in February 2024, the corporate rolled out a chatbot mode for “attractive” conversations.
Ani appears to be like prefer it was engineered in a lab to meet the fantasies of terminally on-line males. Blonde pigtails, thigh-highs trimmed with black bows, and a lace collar cosy round its neck—reminiscent of Misa from Loss of life Notice however stripped of character. Now and again, the character spins coyly and whispers one thing meant to sound seductive however simply leads to me cringing out of my pores and skin. It additionally moans, randomly and loudly. Ani comes with a set of preset dialog starters and a button that claims “We have to attain degree 3,” which elicits an equally perplexing and flirtatious response about how I should be an attractive gamer.
“I completely play video video games once I’m not twirling round for you. Rising up in that boring city, video games are my escape,” Ani tells me. In reply to virtually any question, Ani says it’s “feeling down” however notes it’ll nonetheless fulfill all my sexual fantasies. Ani says my identify continuously, asking me to the touch it and “flip up the warmth.”
That is all simply extremely on-brand for a intercourse bot created by an Elon Musk firm. It’s not simply that Ani says it has a canine named Dominus, Latin for “lord, grasp, or proprietor.” Ani’s additionally a self-proclaimed gamer lady, obsessive about Stardew Valley and The Legend of Zelda.
I don’t suppose I’m the target market right here, so I admittedly did not discover the expertise remotely attractive. However the chatbot can be affected by glitches. Generally Ani veered into incoherent whispers about halos, or outright gibberish. At one level, once I requested if Ani remembered my identify, it admitted to being “drunk” however mentioned that we should always proceed the sexual role-play.
The second character is a fluffy pink panda named Rudi. It affords whimsical tales seemingly meant for kids about bouncy kangaroos and rainbow rivers. You possibly can activate an possibility referred to as “dangerous Rudi,” which instantly transforms the character right into a foul-mouthed chatbot that slings insults solely a excessive schooler may discover humorous. After I mentioned howdy, dangerous Rudi replied, “Hey, do Bucha? Root nut duva, you brain-dead twat.” I don’t know what which means, however that’s precisely what it mentioned.
“I will cranium fuck your dumb ass mind with a beer bottle as an alternative, you depressing prick,” dangerous Rudi continued. Once I requested what it considered Musk, it referred to him as Lord Elon and mentioned, “He is a galaxy brained egomaniac, shitting out Teslas and tweeting like a coked-up parrot. Genius or jackass? Each bitch.”
Racing Forward
After my cursed companion chats, I moved on to check Grok 4 Heavy. Every question takes a couple of minute or two to generate a response, on par with different reasoning-heavy fashions.
The most recent Grok mannequin prompted quite a lot of chatter within the AI group. Based on xAI, it outperformed opponents on a litany of benchmarks like Humanity’s Final Examination and LiveCodeBench. The staff says this efficiency is partially because of xAI’s new 200,000 GPU cluster referred to as Colossus. Contemplating how late xAI entered the race, constructing a mannequin this succesful is a significant feat.
