An AI app designed to allow people to talk to their deceased loved ones is being compared to a Black Mirror episode. The application is created by 2wai, and the company has released a short promotional video for the app. However, the comment section has been filled with criticism about the app’s overall concept.
AI tool lets users talk to deceased loved ones
Calum Worthy, the co-founder of 2wai, posted a video promoting the app on his X (formerly Twitter) account. The video shows a pregnant woman who is talking to her deceased mother on what looks like a standard video call. It shows the elderly woman giving her daughter advice on how to manage her pregnancy and asks her to pat her belly and hum, because this helped her too while being pregnant.
The scene then shifts to after the birth of the woman’s child as she asks the AI version of her mother to tell her child a bedtime story. The child is then shown at 10 years old, and the AI grandma and the boy talk about his life. The video then shows the boy grown to a man and talking with the AI version of his grandmother about his own child that is on the way.
The “Black Mirror” AI app 2wai asks users to record their loved ones while they are alive. It suggests that it “can last forever.”
Commenters on X have been overwhelmingly critical of the app. One posted, “Demonic, dishonest, and dehumanizing. If I die and you put words in my mouth, I will curse you for all eternity. My value dies with me. I’m not a f*****g avatar.” Another commented under the video, “Oh goody, another way for people to completely lose touch with reality and avoid the normal process of grief.”
