Marry Me, Google: 450,000 Indians Pop the Question to Virtual Assistant
Feelings continue to grow for our AI companions.
After learning last year that 25% of voice assistant users admitted having sexual fantasies about the technology, it’s perhaps no surprise that such lust has been evolving into something more.
In fact, it appears life is imitating art, particularly the film Her, in which a man develops romantic feelings for his operating system.
According to Quartz, a whopping 450,000 marriage proposals have been made to Google’s voice assistant from people in India. The figure reportedly comes from a statement Google Vice President Rishi Chandra made at the launch of the Google Home speaker in New Delhi.
But this isn’t an isolated case. Quartz also points out that in 2016 Amazon said 250,000 people had proposed to its voice assistant, Alexa. The humanoid robot Sophia, created by Hanson Robotics in the likeness of Audrey Hepburn, also turned down a request for wedded bliss at tech festival in Bombay.
Of course, proposing to a voice assistant could be a joke, done out of boredom, or be a simple test to hear whether it has a witty response. Most people realize these AI systems are not sentient and robot-human unions are not legally recognized.
However, a lack of sentience and legality doesn’t mean someone can’t fall for a robot. Time will tell how many marriage requests were made in pure jest and how many had some hope or longing behind them.
Image sources: Kaufdex
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