maximus otter
Recovering policeman
- Joined
- Aug 9, 2001
- Messages
- 14,030
It's not terribly hard to understand why some might find grief tech — startups that aim to bottle deceased or dying loved ones into algorithms, in theory preserving them forever — unsettling. Cursed, even. Maybe that's why most companies operating in the grief tech space market their work as a means of preservation, as opposed to resurrection. Upload your writings, memories, and voice recordings into a service, and it creates an algorithmic version of you that surviving friends and family can interface with.
After all, you can't resurrect someone you've never actually lost. Right?
But fascinatingly, that's where an upcoming service called Seance AI — yes, it's actually called that — sets itself apart. It's built by a software development lab called AE Studio, where its creator, a designer named Jarren Rocks, isn't shy about the straightforwardness of the product's name. While other companies often talk around any implication of resurrection, Rocks leans full-tilt into the ghoulishness — and according to him, it's very intentional.
"We're trying to make it sound as magical and as mystical as possible," Rocks [commented], saying the name is a call to attention over how advanced large language model (LLM) tech has gotten.
Rocks likens his product to an AI-generated Ouija board for closure, rather than a means of immortality.
"It's essentially meant to be a short interaction that can provide a sense of closure. That's really where the main focus is here," said Rocks. "It's not meant to be something super long-term. In its current state, it's meant to provide a conversation for closure and emotional processing."
In other words, whatever Seance AI gives you isn't really your loved one. It's just a digital psychic, briefly summoning a digital representation of the deceased so that the living can have one last conversation.
https://futurism.com/ai-seance
maximus otter
After all, you can't resurrect someone you've never actually lost. Right?
But fascinatingly, that's where an upcoming service called Seance AI — yes, it's actually called that — sets itself apart. It's built by a software development lab called AE Studio, where its creator, a designer named Jarren Rocks, isn't shy about the straightforwardness of the product's name. While other companies often talk around any implication of resurrection, Rocks leans full-tilt into the ghoulishness — and according to him, it's very intentional.
"We're trying to make it sound as magical and as mystical as possible," Rocks [commented], saying the name is a call to attention over how advanced large language model (LLM) tech has gotten.
Rocks likens his product to an AI-generated Ouija board for closure, rather than a means of immortality.
"It's essentially meant to be a short interaction that can provide a sense of closure. That's really where the main focus is here," said Rocks. "It's not meant to be something super long-term. In its current state, it's meant to provide a conversation for closure and emotional processing."
In other words, whatever Seance AI gives you isn't really your loved one. It's just a digital psychic, briefly summoning a digital representation of the deceased so that the living can have one last conversation.
https://futurism.com/ai-seance
maximus otter
