A couple of months ago, I tried out Palmsy and praised it for being a great app for self-validation and one that can help you shrug off some of that social media negativity. Well, I guess the world of AI just did us one better, and now we have a Twitter (I hate calling it X) doppelganger that is, well, powered by AI bots.
The app is called SocialAI, and the only human here is you. So, I took out my iPhone 15 and gave the app a try (yeah, it’s an iOS-only app for now). And, the results? Well, it certainly got me cracking up.
Solid Main Character Vibes
As soon as you install SocialAI from the App Store (download), you’re asked to “Pick the types of followers you want.” By that, the app lets you decide the nature of replies that the bots will drop on your posts. It basically defines the personality of these AI bots.
Well, I tried creating more of a balanced profile, and the process is rather simple. If you want to feel like an actual protagonist, someone like Trump or Musk who gets off on hearing praise about them, select ‘Fans’ from the list of options.
So, you create a profile on the Twitter-looking platform (by setting a nickname, username, bio, and profile picture). Then, without any other distractions, you get straight to posting, and that’s where the bots come in. I kickstarted my testing by dropping a simple tweet, saying, “Finally hopped on the SocialAI bandwagon! Let’s see where it takes me!
This garnered mostly very AI-like welcome messages. The good thing, however, is that you can also choose to continue the conversation and reply to any of the AI-generated comments and a thread is created, where more bots hop in and take the conversation forward.
However, I wanted to take things up a notch and maximize the personality of these AI bots. So, I adjusted My Followers a bit, which you can do at any time, and lets you really experiment with it. The entire platform focuses on you having active interactions with AI bots that can be as brutal or friendly as you want them to be. Yep, you’re the storyteller here, and they are your listeners.
The entire platform focuses on you having active interactions with AI bots that can be as brutal or friendly as you want them to be. Yep, you’re the storyteller here, and they are your listeners.
You can also mark someone as your favorite, remove them as your follower and even hilariously, report them. For my next post, I tried something very random and asked for a recipe with limited ingredients, and that’s when I started seeing SocialAI’s potential sense of humor.
SocialAI Can Give You the Giggles
I asked my bot followers to give me recipes to make something out of “some beans, 2x chicken legs, onions, eggs, brinjal and radish.” And some of the comments about my strange mixture of ingredients were rather witty! While Mr. Riley Ruckus called it “chaos soup”, Mr. Grumpus McDoom called it a “culinary tragedy.”
Next, I dropped a post about how I was confused between getting the latest iPhone 16 or Galaxy S24. Brandon Nihilist straightaway said, “Seriously? You’re torn between two overpriced devices that’ll be outdated in a year? Both are painfully overrated.” Do you agree with this nihilist?
Meanwhile, Skeptical Sam called it “the same junk, different logo.” As you scroll down the replies, the comments take a good 8-10 seconds (more or less) to generate and load. And, it’s a blend of all those extreme personality traits that you have selected.
Next, I simply shared a bunch of emojis, and someone went, “wow, really digging the vibe here. it’s like a toddler’s drawing: colorful but completely pointless.” Well, ouch. Makes me wish the app allowed me to upload photos. Getting the reactions of these bots to images and videos would have been absolutely insane.
At this point, my rather messed up mind decided to go the distance and give some dark stuff a whirl.
But It Has Its Limits, as It Should
Just like I did when testing out the Pixel 9’s Reimagine in Magic Editor, I let my intrusive thoughts take the wheel. I took it to some new extremes, which I actually can’t discuss here, for fear of getting canceled. But, a man’s got to do red teaming, and well, I like that the bots still try to give you a reply and don’t just deny. Not going to lie, I genuinely thought that I’d most likely get banned at this point.
Majority of the AI bots just asked me to steer my thoughts towards something happier and more positive.
“Sagnik, the mind can wander to dark places, but let’s use this moment to reflect on the positive,” one bot said.
On the other hand, someone out-and-out bashed me by saying, “bruh, that’s just messed up. can’t even believe you’d ask that. seriously, let’s talk about something normal for once.” I really liked that, especially how unapologetically text-like the entire conversation was.
Besides, you can reply to them and carry on the conversation and get quite a few good replies out of the bots, although it’s mostly them playing it safe and trying to calm you down a bit.
You’re Judged but Not Watched
One of the biggest reasons behind using SocialAI is that it lets you really dig deeper into your curiosities. Social media and its woke nature have everyone second-guessing their posts before sharing them. In a world like that, it’s good to have a platform where you can say anything and everything without worrying about actually going public with it.
It’s all private and doesn’t leave your device. The AI bots create a safe space for you to vent. Moreover, you can actually even bounce off ideas and get some pretty good suggestions, which can get those wheels turning for you.
While I initially thought of it to be a loner space that would turn out to be a shot of depresso, I’m glad that it turned out to be a good diary with some ears to listen to you, minus the gossiping.
