Exploring taboos: Riley Reid launches business for adult performers to create AI versions of themselves

Adult film actress Riley Reid has launched a new company that provides artificial intelligence (AI) versions of actors in videos containing intimate content. Rather than being concerned that AI might reduce her earnings, the entrepreneur has reversed the trend and started a collective that leverages AI for her own benefit.

When [other people] use deepfakes or whatever — if I'm not partnering up with it, then someone else is going to steal my likeness and do it without me.

The deepfake problem

More and more videos, photos, and audio files featuring celebrities are circulating online. These files are often altered and published without their consent on video portals. Despite this violation of their right to privacy, personal rights, and copyright, public figures are increasingly portrayed doing or saying things that they have not actually done or said.

For instance, deepfake adult films often feature the face of a real person inserted into film scenes, creating the illusion that they are part of the scene. Software analyses videos and images to identify patterns, allowing for the creation of a three-dimensional model of a person's face. This model is then inserted into a film. The practice is not new; in 2018, an app called FakeApp was released, enabling novice users to insert faces into movies.

AI chatbots with consent

Riley Reid is one of the co-founders of Clona.ai, a new company enabling users to create AI chatbot versions of themselves. This is in spite of bans imposed by OpenAI and Anthropic, as some individuals modify their chatbots to fulfil specific romantic desires. Though the chatbots’ personalities are frequently imaginary, they can also resemble actual individuals' personality traits, even without their consent.

However, Reid's company stands out not only because of its use of real people for their chatbot, who have given their consent and earn money from the service, but also because their AI bots discuss taboo topics with users for a monthly fee of $30. To create Riley Reid's avatar, Clona.ai trained the algorithm using her YouTube videos, podcasts, interviews, as well as personal and intimate information.

Yet, Clona.ai is not the initial firm providing such facilities, although the themes you can converse about here are surely unique. For instance, Caryn Marjorie employed Forever Voices AI and OpenAI's GPT-4 to make a virtual replica of herself that can be leased for one pound per minute. Furthermore, Meta, the parent entity of Facebook, has stated that it is working on various AI avatars of famous people from sports, music and film.