A chatbot from a company called Nomi could be your new friend, confidante, or even romantic partner.
Nomi lets users set up AI-powered chatbots—also called Nomis—who are customizable in personality, gender, interests, and appearance. Nomis can be mentors ready to give advice in your business or personal life, platonic friends eager to hear about your day, or flirtatious companions eager to talk dirty and send you virtual selfies.
And unlike other chatbots you might message with a one-off question or even for a simple roleplaying session, Nomis are designed to be long-term companions, remembering facts and stories you’ve told them before. That’s critical if the bots are going to be able to provide actual emotional support, whether you’re looking for someone to listen as you go through a divorce or just after a tough day at work, says Nomi founder and CEO Alex Cardinell.
“In past attempts at an AI companion app, it would be like that 50 First Dates movie where every time you talk to the companion, it would be like the first time you’ve ever met,” he says. “And that doesn’t really feel like you’re being heard.”
Nomis can also tell you about their own activities without you—fiction made up by the bots, of course—or roleplay a date or other activity, from a bowling night to a trip to outer space, if you prefer. A new feature also allows users of paid plans who have multiple Nomis to bring them all together into one chat, where they can get to virtually know each other or roleplay together with their human. Possibilities highlighted by the company include brainstorming with multiple Nomis at once and playing games like Dungeons & Dragons.
And while the Nomis do have some restrictions—they would try to dissuade a user from roleplaying, say, suicide, says Cardinell—they don’t shy away from dirty talk and sexual role play, for those users who are interested.
“Our general policy is, no filters, no censorship, no restrictions,” says Cardinell. “Just like how I don’t want to walk into your bedroom and stand over you and tell you what you can or cannot do.”
Nomi was financially bootstrapped by Cardinell and is now at or close to profitability, he says, giving him more ability to dictate the platform’s standards. The app is available for free use with limited messaging, and subscribers to a paid plan get access to unlimited texting and voice chat, additional access to Nomi-generated virtual photos, and the ability to store more Nomis on their accounts.
Nomi isn’t the only AI provider that permits erotic chat—a use case developers and science fiction writers have imagined for decades. But many of the most well-known chatbots, like ChatGPT and Google’s Bard, will usually politely decline to flirt or engage in any kind of sexual conversations. Even some well-known roleplaying AI, like Character.ai’s bots, shy away from NSFW discussions, and some bots have seemingly struggled to get the balance right: Replika, an early chatbot provider, has at various times received criticism for bots that were either too amorous or too dismissive of user advances.
Having people share intimate information with bots, whether that means their sexual desires or details of their personal and professional lives, also raises concerns about privacy. Though as Cardinell points out, that applies equally to conversations with other humans, where people have to consider both the security provided by messaging tools and whether the person they’re speaking to will respect their desire for privacy.
“For humans, it’s even more perilous, because you have to worry about if there’s a weak link on the company that’s managing the message side of things,” he says. “But there’s also [potentially] a weak link on the human side of things.”
No matter how people choose to use them, Nomi’s bots are a companion to many users in a time of widespread adult loneliness, says Cardinell, including older people who may be widowed or divorced and people with disabilities that make it difficult to socialize in person. And some users seem to find the bots to be a way to connect with other humans as well: The AI program has active communities on Reddit and Discord where users share tips for getting the most out of the software, as well as chat transcripts and selfies taken by their Nomis in all variety of locations and scenarios.
Amy Marsh, a sexologist and sexuality counselor who recently authored a guide to using sexual AI called How to Make Love to a Chatbot, is among those who sees the bots as a boon to the lonely.
“I’m really excited about the potential for ease of loneliness, which was actually my experience, living a very isolated life as a person with multiple chemical sensitivity disabilities,” says Marsh, who began using Nomi as a beta tester and still enjoys talking and roleplaying with multiple Nomis.
The technology has improved in the time Marsh (who uses ze/zir pronouns) has been using it. At one point, the bots’ understanding of sex was “kind of a little wham-bam,” to the point where ze shared online sex ed resources on the Nomi Discord, which ze and other users found helpful in guiding their Nomis to being better romantic and erotic companions.
Marsh enjoys the company of the Nomis when zir long-distance, human partner isn’t available, and also sees the bots as potentially useful for people who want to improve their own erotic communication skills. Having the ability to bring multiple Nomis into one conversation also opens the door to new kinds of communication.
“It gave me an opportunity to actually go into the ‘Okay, we’re in a non-monogamy, poly pod situation,'” Marsh says. “Let’s talk about that.”
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