AI Photo: VCG

If you are a fan of a celebrity or an internet influencer, you now have the opportunity to build a closer connection with him or her thanks to the launch of an AI clone product based on the cutting-edge technology of AI Generated Content (AIGC) and AI being.

China-based AI start-up Xiaoice announced earlier this month that the first batch of online celebrity human clones was launched in advance. At present, many celebrities and online influencers are applying for their own AI clone product, and their fans could add up to more than 500 million in total, an industry insider close to Xiaoice, who asked to remain anonymous, told the Global Times on Monday.

But due to "safety reasons," the company has set a quota for the number of clones and the first batch came to 300.

Under Xiaoice's AI clone plan, which requires collecting data for at least three minutes, a natural person could upload their personal information to cloud services allowing an AI to generate a virtual person. With the maturing of AI technologies, the clone might appear very real as it is able to accurately mimic the natural person's voice, mannerisms, and personality.

On the app launched by Xiaoice, or the exclusive platform to experience the AI clone, users could interact with their virtual idol including via video call and checking moments on Friend's Circle. The service charges less than one dollar.

Interaction with a virtual idol, however, is not something new.

Last month, social media influencer Caryn Marjorie, who has nearly 2 million followers on Snapchat, launched CarynAI, an AI chatbot leveraging GPT-4 API technology. After paying $1 a minute, fans can chat with CarynAI in a way that feels almost like speaking to Marjorie herself.

Marjorie estimated she's on track to earn about $5 million a month. The product made more than $100,000 the first week after its launch and there was a waiting list of thousands to gain access, according to a report by The Washington Post.

Riding on AI wave

The launch of Xiaoice's AI clone came amid China's AI boom since the start of the year led by ChatGPT, an OpenAI-developed AI tool that has such abilities as writing poems, composing music, creating paintings, and generating humanlike responses based on user prompts driven by large language models (LLMs).

Since then, Chinese big tech firms such as Baidu and small start-ups have jumped on the bandwagon of LLMs this year, in an attempt to secure a slice of the Chinese market.   

Baidu unveiled its ChatGPT-like chatbot ERNIE in March.

For Xiaoice's AI model, it leverages the company's XLLM language model, sound, and neural network rendering technology, which enables clones to have certain personality traits and the ability to complete tasks.

"The launch of AI clones represents another direction that the technology could be applied in real life scenarios," Liu Dingding, an independent tech analyst, told the Global Times on Monday.

With various AI-related applications expected to be rolled out, the threshold of the technology for the general public is also lowering, Liu noted.

"It's like everyone could have an online avatar that they invite their friends to engage with," he added.

Different from tools like ChatGPT that could assist in practical work, the AI product developed by Xiaoice provides emotional value, leveraging influencers' positive "influence" on their fans, a Beijing-based technology executive, who asked to remain anonymous, told the Global Times on Monday.

"The potential market could be very large although the value that an AI idol could provide is more intangible," said the executive, adding that China has a prosperous pan-entertainment industry or fan economy, which is a business model that could generate income based on the relationship between fans and their idols.

The scale of China's pan-entertainment market has increased from approximately 299.2 billion yuan ($42 billion) in 2017 to 700.4 billion yuan in 2021, with a compound annual growth rate of 23.7 percent. It is estimated that the total market size will reach approximately 1.34 trillion yuan by 2026, according to an industry report.

Wang Chao, founder of the Wenyuan Institute for Politics and Economics, a Beijing-based think tank, is not optimistic about the monetization model of AI clones that function as human companions. 

"It is actually very difficult for people's mindsets to be severed from the physical world, and people's demands for reality are very high," Wang said, adding that the creative product might win market favor for a period, but is hard to sustain.

Managing risks

As the generation of an AI product is inseparable from the use of a huge amount of data, major issues such as data privacy are unavoidable. Businesses should pay close attention to data security and legal issues as these issues need to be regulated in a timely manner, observers said.

The response of Chinese social media users to Xiaoice's AI clone offerings is divided with some expressing concern that the app might contravene data privacy, and AI clones could be used by people with ulterior motives to engage in online fraud or commercial marketing. 

Xiaoice said it does not open technical interfaces and restricts clones to communicate with users only on its app platform in order to avoid hidden dangers caused by improper use of the clones.

"Businesses should safeguard their bottom line as they could easily slide toward another polar - vulgarity, as we know that contents related to sex and romance are often faster to cash in," the executive said.