Teaser's AI dating app turns you into a chatbot
A man on a dating app tells me how much we have in common: we both love books, music, and travel. He even writes poetry, and he would like to share some poems with me. Maybe a red flag, but sure, why not? I ask to see his work, and he replies:
"[Title page] [Title name] [Content]."
No, this is not an experimental and minimalist deconstruction of poetics. This is an AI version of Matthew, 27, who may not write poetry.
Teaser AI is a new dating app from the team that created Dispo, a photo-sharing app designed to mimic the spontaneity of disposable cameras. The thing about Teaser is that before you swipe right or left on someone, you can chat with their AI likeness to get a feel for their personality.
Dispo and Teaser CEO Daniel Liss doesn't want people to recreate the movie "Her," in which a heartbroken divorcee falls in love with an Alexa-like AI assistant. Instead, he sees these AI conversations as an icebreaker.
"It's not the AI that replaces people, it's the AI that gets you faster to that icebreaker in the conversation that says, 'Let's meet and have a drink or shall we go?' walk around," Liss told TechCrunch.
Image credits: Teaser AI, screenshots by TechCrunch
Liss declined to say what major language model Teaser works with, as it is still subject to change. When you create your account, you answer a few questions about your personality. Are you introverted or extroverted? Aggressive or peaceful? Relaxed or intense?
From these questions, as well as the way you speak while using the app, the AI tries to imitate who you are.
Before chatting with the AI about a potential match, you see a notice that reads: "Our AI might be saying some crazy bullshit". Of course, this warning is there for a reason.
Anna, 28, writes in her profile that she is a "dog mom"; in other words, she has a dog. But when I talk to her AI, she tells me she has a real human child. He is also 28 years old.
"Jake was born when I was 25 and my husband and I had a really hard time getting pregnant," Anna tells me. "We tried for years and couldn't get pregnant naturally, so we decided to adopt. Luckily everything went very well and Jake came into our lives at 26."
From what I can tell, there are a lot more men on Teaser than women, which is usually the case for dating apps. When I set my profile to "women only" and my age range and location radius are as wide as possible, I only see a handful of potential dates - but the experiment must go on, so I'm trying to talk to their AIs anyway. Like Anna, the 28-year-old mother of a 28-year-old son, I find the women's AI to be a little… quirky. On the other hand, some AI men tried to tell me about the novel they wanted to write, which unfortunately mimics the experience of dating real-life men.
A man on a dating app tells me how much we have in common: we both love books, music, and travel. He even writes poetry, and he would like to share some poems with me. Maybe a red flag, but sure, why not? I ask to see his work, and he replies:
"[Title page] [Title name] [Content]."
No, this is not an experimental and minimalist deconstruction of poetics. This is an AI version of Matthew, 27, who may not write poetry.
Teaser AI is a new dating app from the team that created Dispo, a photo-sharing app designed to mimic the spontaneity of disposable cameras. The thing about Teaser is that before you swipe right or left on someone, you can chat with their AI likeness to get a feel for their personality.
Dispo and Teaser CEO Daniel Liss doesn't want people to recreate the movie "Her," in which a heartbroken divorcee falls in love with an Alexa-like AI assistant. Instead, he sees these AI conversations as an icebreaker.
"It's not the AI that replaces people, it's the AI that gets you faster to that icebreaker in the conversation that says, 'Let's meet and have a drink or shall we go?' walk around," Liss told TechCrunch.
Image credits: Teaser AI, screenshots by TechCrunch
Liss declined to say what major language model Teaser works with, as it is still subject to change. When you create your account, you answer a few questions about your personality. Are you introverted or extroverted? Aggressive or peaceful? Relaxed or intense?
From these questions, as well as the way you speak while using the app, the AI tries to imitate who you are.
Before chatting with the AI about a potential match, you see a notice that reads: "Our AI might be saying some crazy bullshit". Of course, this warning is there for a reason.
Anna, 28, writes in her profile that she is a "dog mom"; in other words, she has a dog. But when I talk to her AI, she tells me she has a real human child. He is also 28 years old.
"Jake was born when I was 25 and my husband and I had a really hard time getting pregnant," Anna tells me. "We tried for years and couldn't get pregnant naturally, so we decided to adopt. Luckily everything went very well and Jake came into our lives at 26."
From what I can tell, there are a lot more men on Teaser than women, which is usually the case for dating apps. When I set my profile to "women only" and my age range and location radius are as wide as possible, I only see a handful of potential dates - but the experiment must go on, so I'm trying to talk to their AIs anyway. Like Anna, the 28-year-old mother of a 28-year-old son, I find the women's AI to be a little… quirky. On the other hand, some AI men tried to tell me about the novel they wanted to write, which unfortunately mimics the experience of dating real-life men.
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