(Wired) – People have always defaced New York subway ads in every way imaginable, but what happened with the Friend ads tapped into a deep angst about AI. Even as some celebrate its possibilities (drug discovery) and others decry its ramifications (environmental impacts, job erasure), the suggestion that AI’s killer app could be a Loneliness Cure seemed to hit a nerve.

An actual, flesh-encased nerve.

Friend was just the latest in a series of Silicon Valley offerings debuting in 2025 that promise digital companionship. In addition to suggesting you just pour your heart out to ChatGPT, tech companies proffered AI-powered travel guides, dating app wingmen, and sexytime chatbots. Teens are increasingly turning to AI for friendship. Five years after Covid-19 isolated millions of people and more than two years after the US surgeon general declared loneliness an “epidemic,” AI has emerged as a form of social media that offers even less actual socializing than what came before. (Read More)