On Wednesday, Elon Musk discussed a new male AI “companion” that his company xAI is developing, which will run on the company’s unhinged chatbot software Grok. And while it’s not yet clear when this new robot buddy will be released, it sounds an awful lot like Musk is trying to make a romanticized version of himself.
Musk first tweeted an image of the anime-inspired bot on Tuesday, asking followers on X what it should be named. The billionaire has already released two AI companions that use Grok, an anime-style woman and a red panda, both of whom have been met with a mix of excitement and disgust for various reasons.
The billionaire xAI founder wrote Wednesday that his unnamed bot would have a personality “inspired by Edward Cullen from Twilight and Christian Grey from 50 Shades.” It’s unclear whether Musk knows that 50 Shades of Grey started as Twilight fan fiction and Christian Grey is essentially the same character as Edward. It’s also unclear whether the copyright holders for the Twilight and 50 Shades of Grey books and movies will mind that a billionaire oligarch is building an AI sex robot based on their characters.
But what is clear is that Musk probably sees himself as that new AI character in some capacity. How can we say that? Well, there’s a rather infamous photo of Musk from 2012 where he was dressed in a style that looks pretty identical to his new AI bot.
“Wore Marquis de Sade outfit for a party last night. Was v popular with women who’d read 50 Shades :)” Musk wrote in a tweet from June 18, 2012. The photo doesn’t appear to be loading in Musk’s original tweet on X, but it’s been archived across the web, as you can see above.
Musk’s two AI chatbot creations, a woman named Ani and a red panda named Bad Rudy, both seem to serve very different roles. And they’re both centered around characters that Musk himself would probably want around. Ani is intended to be Musk’s version of a perfect girlfriend, constantly flirting and praising the user. While Bad Rudy is the perfect bro friend, constantly insulting you in the way an immature 13-year-old boy does to test out his comedy chops.
What was missing? Something for the ladies, of course. The perfect man. Elon. Or the version of Elon he wishes he could be. Brooding, in control, highly sexual, and such a manly man. The guy with the long, black hair. A man with no signs of balding. A man with no need for hair plugs.
When a female X user replied to Musk that he should release a version based on Mr. Darcy, a character from Jane Austen’s 1813 book Pride and Prejudice, Musk replied in the affirmative: “We will, of course, have another character inspired by Mr. Darcy.” That would obviously be a safer bet, given the fact that Austen’s book is now in the public domain and can be used without paying royalties for IP.
There’s no telling how sexual this new ersatz Elon will be, but given Ani’s attitude, we imagine this new AI bot will primarily seek to titillate. And while Musk may not be physically capable of inseminating every woman on the planet, as the father of 14 or more kids would like to do, he’ll know his AI avatar is out there to do it digitally.
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