I’ve read some positive reviews of Replika – a commercial system that is somewhat promoted as a counsellor [2], so I decided to try it out. In my brief trial it seemed to be using all the methods that Android pay to play games are known for. Having multiple types of in-game currency, pay to buy new clothes etc for your friend, etc. Basically it seems pretty horrible. I didn’t pay for it and the erotic and romantic features all require payment so I didn’t test that.
When thinking about this logically, having a system designed to deal with people when they are vulnerable (either being in a romantic relationship or getting counselling) that uses manipulative techniques to get money from them can’t have a good result. So a free software system seems the best option.
When I first learned of virtual girlfriends I never thought I would feel compelled to advocate for a free software virtual dating program, but that’s where the world has got to.
Virtual girlfriends have been around for years now. Several years ago I watched a documentary about their use in Japan. It seemed a bit strange when a group of men who had virtual girlfriends had a dinner party with their tablets and phones propped up so their girlfriends could join in as they all appeared to be dating the same girl. The documentary didn’t go in to enough detail to cover whether the girlfriend app could learn or be customised enough that they would seem to have different personalities.
Virtual boyfriends have also been around for a while apparently without most people noticing. I just Googled it and found a review of a virtual boyfriend app published in 2016!
One thing that will probably concern people is the possibility for virtual dating systems to be used for inappropriate things. That is a reasonable thing to be concerned about but I don’t think it’s possible to prevent technology that has already been released from doing such things. As a general rule technology can always be used for good and bad things so we need to just make it easy to do good things and let the legal system develop ways of dealing with the bad things.