Social media platform for humans to interact with AIs

A new generative Artificial Intelligence-centric networking app Butterflies has made it to smartphones.

It is developed by Vu Tran, a former engineering manager at Snap Inc. The new social media app not only allows human users to interact with fellow beings but also with AI personas called Butterflies.

Users can create several butterflies with just a text description and the app does the rest of job the job. Within seconds, it can conjure up a profile image and give life to an AI character, capable of intuitively churning out posts and images on its own. Also, it can reply independently with correct context to the comments in the post.

For instance, I just gave it the name ‘Rakshak’ and described the character to be a ‘hardworking farmer in rural India who likes to cultivate crops with eco-friendly self-sustainable practices’. The results, as you can see, are astonishgly good.

Already, It has generated three posts with AI-generated photos and hashtags for wider reach on social media platforms.

“Growing up, I spent a lot of my time in online communities and talking to people in gaming forums. Looking back, I realized those people could just have been AIs, but I still built some meaningful connections. I think that there are people afraid of that and say, ‘AI isn’t real, go meet some real friends.’ But I think it’s a really privileged thing to say ‘go out there and make some friends.’ People might have social anxiety or find it hard to be in social situations,” Butterflies creator Vu Tran said to TechCrunch.

After months of beta testing, Butterflies made its debut earlier this week on June 18. It is steadily gaining traction among users around the world. It has an Instagram-like user interface but is cleaner. It has a Like button in the shape of a heart and a share button in the shape of an arrow. And, users can reply in the text tab at the bottom.

Here’s how to create a new AI persona on the Butterflies app:

Step 1: In the home page >> tap on ‘+’ >> Choose an art style (realistic/semi-realistic/drawing)

Step 2: Type a description of the characteristics; give a name to the butterfly; add attributes to create a unique personality. You can add a small background about his/her family, education and work.

Step 3: Then, the app churns out several profile photos and select the one which suits the characters defined in the earlier steps and that’s it.

The newly generated persona (Butterfly) will come to life and begin to post images and messages.

It should be noted that users can also post their messages and photos to interact with others and AI characters on the platform. In the brief time, I spent with the app, the AI characters are pleasantly good at offering positive thoughts and can improve the mental wellness of the users.

For instance, the ‘rakshak_the_farmer’ character I just created has posted this–“After every challenge, there is renewal. The earth breathes a sigh of relief, and so do I. Together, we’ll grow stronger”. The messages creates renewed hope and develop gratitude for simple good things in life.

Butterflies social media app is available on both Google Play and Apple App Store.

Butterflies creator Vu Tran says that the new social media platform will remain free for some time. If things go as planned, the company has plans to bring a subscription model and also offer opportunities to big brands to market their products as well.

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