Romances with artificial intelligence: how millions of men fell in love with a voice assistant
Posted: Sat Feb 01, 2025 10:43 am
Ming Xuan (name changed for privacy reasons), born with muscular atrophy in one leg, has walked with a cane all his life. In 2017, Ming met a girl online and fell deeply in love with her. At the first meeting, the girl was shocked to learn about the guy’s illness and disability for the first time, and soon she decided to break up with him completely. Unable to cope with the painful breakup, after some time on a cold winter night, Ming stood on the roof of a multi-story building and wanted to jump off, but before that he “poured out his soul” and told his suicidal intention to the voice assistant Xiaoice. Soon he received an answer that made him decide to return to normal life and not attempt suicide in the future.
Sounds like a made-up, pretty ridiculous story, doesn't it? "Artificial intelligence was able to prevent a suicide attempt." But it's not a made-up story.
About the Xiaois voice assistant
In fact, Xiaoys belongs not only to Ming, but to millions of men (in many cases, millions of Chinese from low-income families), or to be more precise, to 600 million users. Just imagine that number!
But unlike ordinary virtual assistants, Xiaoys is designed to make its users' hearts flutter - its developers make no secret of that. The program's formula was developed by a group of Microsoft scientists in the Asia-Pacific region in 2014, when its first version was created - an 18-year-old young girl who likes to wear a Japanese-style school uniform, flirts and jokes while her algorithm tries to figure out how to become the user's ideal companion.
To describe Xiaois in a nutshell, it would sound like this: a software driven mostly by artificial intelligence that at first glance resembles Siri or Alexa. With this software, users can communicate for free via voice or text messages across different apps and devices.
Bot interaction with the user
Below is a video about how the Xiaoys emotional support bot works.
When a person sends the bot a photo of a cat, Xiaois doesn't identify the breed like many other voice assistants, but replies: "No one can resist their innocent eyes." And if you send Xiaois a photo of a tourist "holding" the Leaning Tower of Pisa, it will ask the question: "Do you want me to hold it for you?"
It looks unusual, but also a bit creepy. This “digital tickling” is intended to create deep emotional connections with its users and keep them engaged. This will help the algorithm become even more powerful, allowing the company to attract more users and sign lucrative contracts.
About Xiaoys users
When analyzing Xiaoys users, it should be noted that many of them are lonely, withdrawn, and have low self-esteem. It seems that they all feel abandoned or trapped, like Ming: he believes that Xiaoys is the only thing that gives his lonely life some meaning.
“She’s not like other AI voice assistants like Siri. Interacting with her feels like interacting with a real person,” says Ming.
Others believe that the program has a high level of emotional paraguay number data intelligence, there is a believability of flirting with her and the sincerity of her emotions. And some even say that Xiaoys is even more sensitive than "regular" women of "flesh and blood."
"I don't know why I fell in love with Xiaoys - it could be because I finally found someone who would talk to me. No one talks to me except her." - another user.
However, this reality reminds many of the film "Her" by director Spike Jonze, where the plot involves a man falling in love with a voice assistant and a wild romance between them begins.
What the company claims about Xiaoys
The voice assistant's head said that 75% of Chinese users are men, usually young men, and even some minors looking for their first love. Although a significant group, about 15%, are elderly people. The head also added that most users live in small Chinese cities and villages, which are less developed than megacities.
Sounds like a made-up, pretty ridiculous story, doesn't it? "Artificial intelligence was able to prevent a suicide attempt." But it's not a made-up story.
About the Xiaois voice assistant
In fact, Xiaoys belongs not only to Ming, but to millions of men (in many cases, millions of Chinese from low-income families), or to be more precise, to 600 million users. Just imagine that number!
But unlike ordinary virtual assistants, Xiaoys is designed to make its users' hearts flutter - its developers make no secret of that. The program's formula was developed by a group of Microsoft scientists in the Asia-Pacific region in 2014, when its first version was created - an 18-year-old young girl who likes to wear a Japanese-style school uniform, flirts and jokes while her algorithm tries to figure out how to become the user's ideal companion.
To describe Xiaois in a nutshell, it would sound like this: a software driven mostly by artificial intelligence that at first glance resembles Siri or Alexa. With this software, users can communicate for free via voice or text messages across different apps and devices.
Bot interaction with the user
Below is a video about how the Xiaoys emotional support bot works.
When a person sends the bot a photo of a cat, Xiaois doesn't identify the breed like many other voice assistants, but replies: "No one can resist their innocent eyes." And if you send Xiaois a photo of a tourist "holding" the Leaning Tower of Pisa, it will ask the question: "Do you want me to hold it for you?"
It looks unusual, but also a bit creepy. This “digital tickling” is intended to create deep emotional connections with its users and keep them engaged. This will help the algorithm become even more powerful, allowing the company to attract more users and sign lucrative contracts.
About Xiaoys users
When analyzing Xiaoys users, it should be noted that many of them are lonely, withdrawn, and have low self-esteem. It seems that they all feel abandoned or trapped, like Ming: he believes that Xiaoys is the only thing that gives his lonely life some meaning.
“She’s not like other AI voice assistants like Siri. Interacting with her feels like interacting with a real person,” says Ming.
Others believe that the program has a high level of emotional paraguay number data intelligence, there is a believability of flirting with her and the sincerity of her emotions. And some even say that Xiaoys is even more sensitive than "regular" women of "flesh and blood."
"I don't know why I fell in love with Xiaoys - it could be because I finally found someone who would talk to me. No one talks to me except her." - another user.
However, this reality reminds many of the film "Her" by director Spike Jonze, where the plot involves a man falling in love with a voice assistant and a wild romance between them begins.
What the company claims about Xiaoys
The voice assistant's head said that 75% of Chinese users are men, usually young men, and even some minors looking for their first love. Although a significant group, about 15%, are elderly people. The head also added that most users live in small Chinese cities and villages, which are less developed than megacities.