The internet celebrity became an AI girlfriend, earning 720,000 yuan a month?

This article analyzes the "Ban Zang Forest" digital cloning project from the perspective of users and products in a relatively objective and fair manner. It points out that such projects still face many challenges to be truly successful, but at the same time, it is also an attempt to combine Internet celebrities with AI technology to open up new monetization paths. It is worth paying attention to and observing.

For only 6 yuan, you can see the Moments of internet celebrities commented by Wang Sicong, and you can also chat, video call and feel his companionship.

Such a "cost-effective" activity was initiated by the internet celebrity "Hanzang Forest" (hereinafter referred to as Hanzang), who has 2.626 million followers on Weibo.

On June 1, "Hanzo" announced on Weibo that he had signed up to create the world's first batch of digital clones. As long as you download the "X Eva" APP, you can communicate with your clone and get emotional companionship.

While countless people and technology companies are still discussing how to monetize AI technology, internet celebrities who have sensed the trend have already taken the first step: Before "Hanzo", American internet celebrity Caryn launched an AI version of "herself" to fans in May, charging $1 for each minute of chat. Within a week of testing, she earned $71,600 (about 509,000 yuan), which triggered many internet celebrities to follow suit.

Recommendation of Hanzang Forest and App homepage

In China, more than 300,000 people chatted with Hanzo’s digital clone in just one day after it went online. The app crashed due to too many users. On June 3, #半藏森林字幕人 年收入可最高720,000# became a hot search on Weibo. Hanzo responded on his Weibo account “甜甜起切猪” that his digital clone had been offline because of the large number of participants and needed maintenance and additional machines.

Although it has both gimmicks and traffic, the experience of "Internet celebrity companionship" is not very good: many netizens say that the clone of "Hanzo" is too different from the real person, the "smart question and answer" that is said to be able to imitate the personality of a real person is at most a somewhat intelligent search engine, and the video call claiming to be a home perspective was also criticized by netizens as a "scam" because of its stiff expressions and voice.

The platform behind the creation of the digital human "Hanzo" is the company that once launched the artificial intelligence girl "Xiaobing". In addition to "Hanzo", the platform has also launched different types of clones, but the experience is similar, and there is even a situation where "they cannot understand what people say".

As a cutting-edge technology, AI itself has two sides. While the legal basis for AI face-changing live broadcasts is still under debate, Internet celebrities and companies in the emotional companionship business seem to have found another way to quickly monetize traffic.

1. Virtual girlfriend, or “artificial mental retardation”?

If you want to chat with "Hanzo", you need to log in to the X Eva APP first.

On the day Hanzo announced that he was one of the first digital clones, a related promotion appeared on X Eva. On the top banner of the homepage, Hanzo’s photo greeted him, with the words “I launch AI Hanzo Forest, a video phone with a home perspective” written next to it.

Once you enter the platform, you will find that X Eva's functions are not perfect: there is no search bar, and users can only scroll down to browse. In addition to communicating with existing clones on the platform, users can also create their own clones. All they need is a social account to create a realistic clone.

"Hanzo" said in a promotional Weibo that he collected biometric information in the company to make the digital clone more like the real person and have the same personality as the real person. Chatting is currently free, but if you want to view related friend circles and make video calls, you need to use the power of money - 42 ice flowers (6 yuan)/month can get "Hanzo"'s 24-hour companionship, making her your "instant reply" friend, getting voice replies, and you can also view her friend circle; 210 ice flowers (30 yuan)/month can unlock the super mode, which can make "Hanzo" a work assistant, help you write copy and provide inspiration, etc., and you can also make video calls anytime, anywhere.

Perhaps due to too many users, the server had problems for a while. The clone of "Hanzo" was temporarily taken offline after only two days of being online, and related content could not be searched on the platform.

Chat content posted by netizens

However, many netizens have already experienced the feeling of chatting with "Hanzo". Through the information shared by netizens, it can be found that this digital clone is not as advertised: the intelligent replies are like "Baidu" questions and answers most of the time, and the voice content is like the AI-generated answers read out in the voice of "Hanzo". Fans also complained that the clone's "Sichuan and Chongqing Mandarin is too stiff". When users want the clone to be more emotional, the clone will reply "As an AI assistant, my answers are based on preset programs and corpora, not on emotions or personal beliefs", and even directly state his identity "I am an AI assistant", for fear that netizens will mistake him for a real person.

The "home perspective video call" that was full of gimmicks in the promotion was even more distracting. The clone, wearing a suspender skirt and with Hanzo's facial features, had a stiff and strange expression. He could only open his mouth and blink. His overall movements and expressions were half a beat slow, and the picture quality was quite blurry. It was not much different from the virtual people who had sold goods on previous short video platforms.

The legendary Hanzang Forest home perspective video call

Kai, who purchased the service, told E-commerce Online that the experience of chatting with Hanzo’s clone was very poor, “some of the answers seemed to be reposted from Baidu search.” Some fans also posted screenshots online complaining that the clone didn’t even know that Hanzo had two cats. Hanzo replied that it was because the data import was not perfect.

The highly intelligent image in the publicity does not match the clones that netizens have experienced, which has also led many people to joke: "Is this a virtual girlfriend? It feels more like an artificial idiot."

Communicating with other digital clones or virtual boyfriends provided in the app or the official XiaoIce, we can also find that the experience of the clones is quite different from the "second life in a parallel world" in the promotion. E-commerce Online asked XiaoIce "how to search for Hanzang Forest", and XiaoIce replied "open the map application". When asking about "Hanzang Forest clones", XiaoIce directly responded: "Don't say others are Hanzang Forest!"

The official XiaoIce also cannot understand user problems

2. Hanzang Forest and Xiaobing, are they taking the black and red route?

“Does the Internet really have no memory?”

While #Hanzo clones can earn up to 720,000 a year# was trending on the Internet, related comments appeared on social platforms such as Weibo, Xiaohongshu, Douban and even Hupu: "Hanzo", who was previously known as the "originator of pure desire style", has been controversial on social platforms.

In the early years, "Hanzo" became popular on Hupu with several "pure desire style" photos. A photo of her back carrying Nike sneakers frequently appeared in Hupu posts, making her the "ideal girlfriend" in the hearts of many Hupu straight men.

It was not until November 2019 that internet celebrity Aqin spoke out on Weibo, saying that her five-year relationship with her boyfriend Liu Yang was interfered with by "Ban Zang", and "Ban Zang" also experienced a two-level reversal in reputation.

But despite the controversy, the traffic of "Han Zang" is still considerable, even more exaggerated than before: Wang Sicong appeared among the many onlookers. He commented "It's really not Liu Yang's fault" under the photo of "Han Zang", which was criticized by netizens. However, some people shared "the same style as Han Zang" on the Internet, and there were even tutorials imitating "Han Zang's" outfit and makeup.

X Eva, which chose "Hanzo" as the first batch of digital clones, also became popular. This little-known platform is actually backed by Beijing Hongmian Xiaoice Technology Co., Ltd., whose most well-known product is the artificial intelligence girl Xiaoice.

XiaoIce can be regarded as Microsoft's former daughter and ChatGPT's "sister". In 2014, Microsoft launched XiaoIce. At that time, Microsoft Group's global executive vice president Qi Lu called XiaoIce "Microsoft's strategic product in the field of AI", and Microsoft invested in ChatGPT in 2019.

Microsoft XiaoIce's virtual messenger

However, XiaoIce, which appears in various WeChat groups, QQ groups and social platforms, is more like an entertainment tool and has never been commercialized. On July 13, 2020, Microsoft announced that it would spin off its artificial intelligence business XiaoIce into an independent company. Through Qichacha, it can be found that XiaoIce's financing entity is currently a domestic structure, and Microsoft is not involved in the equity relationship.

XiaoIce, who left Microsoft, started her own commercial exploration and also took advantage of the popularity of her successor ChatGPT this year: In an article on AI XiaoIce's official account on May 16, it announced the launch of the "GPT Clone Project", which only requires an individual to collect three minutes of data to create a clone with his or her own personality, skills, voice and appearance.

XiaoIce, which is gradually becoming silent, chose "Hanzo" as the first batch of digital clones, probably because of the controversial traffic behind "Hanzo". This is not the first time that XiaoIce has chosen controversial traffic: at the XiaoIce launch conference on May 29, 2014, 20-year-old Zhang Zetian, who is known as "Milk Tea Sister" as Microsoft's intern product manager, made the final appearance and introduced the various functions of XiaoIce. A month and a half ago, Zhang Zetian's relationship with Liu Qiangdong was exposed by the media.

In 2014, XiaoIce attracted countless fans with the help of the traffic of "Milk Tea Sister". The 100,000 XiaoIce accounts originally planned for a 7-day public beta were snapped up in one day, and the server was overloaded and crashed. Nine years later in 2023, XiaoIce's clone project triggered countless discussions with the help of the traffic of "Hanzo". The influx of netizens caused the "Hanzo" clone to go offline directly, and the APP crashed.

Through this cooperation, Hanzang realized monetization through digital clones, and XiaoIce also returned to the public eye with this wave of traffic. Qimai data shows that on June 1, when Hanzang Forest announced its entry, X Eva's ranking on the iOS lifestyle app list rose by 166 places, and on June 2, it rose by another 90 places to 76th.

3. Internet celebrities use AI to target the companionship economy

Although Hanzo said on Weibo that he had no way to decide whether to charge for digital clones because "the technical cost is too expensive", the X Eva platform stated on the clone creation page that "the profits of the clones in the parallel world belong to the creator." The Beijing Business Daily also stated in a report that someone related to Xiaoice revealed that "Hanzo and Xiaoice have a profit-sharing model, and Hanzo takes the lion's share."

Hanzang Forest's trumpet said "It's not possible to be free"

Hanzo, who provided personal data and authorized the platform to launch digital clones, and Xiaoice, who chose to cooperate with Internet celebrities to launch digital clones, are obviously targeting the companionship economy. Hanzo wants to seize the opportunity while he is still a hot topic and use the companionship economy to monetize his traffic. Xiaoice is also exploring its own new commercialization path and using the new concept of AI to break out of the circle.

Digital clones easily remind people of previous virtual boyfriends, virtual girlfriends and "kuakua groups" and other services. These services can not only be searched on e-commerce platforms and second-hand trading platforms, but have also been used by various apps early on: the Daodao Accounting app recommended by many netizens before allows users to set up the desired virtual objects, and provides dialogue communication and emotional companionship while keeping accounts. Many users said that in order to communicate with virtual objects, they have developed a habit of keeping accounts every day, but the replies of virtual objects are mostly pre-set content, and there are no intelligent replies.

Behind the countless virtual objects is the huge market of the companionship economy. A report released by Guotai Junan Securities once predicted that the market size of the companionship economy will reach about 40 billion to 50 billion yuan in 2025.

"Hanzo" is not the first internet celebrity to use AI technology to monetize emotional value for fans.

In May this year, Caryn Marjorie from California, USA, became a hot topic overseas because of her AI girlfriend. The Snapchat celebrity with 1.8 million followers launched an AI version of herself "Caryn AI" in early May. The AI ​​version was trained with more than 2,000 hours of footage from Caryn on YouTube to create a voice and personality close to her own. Combined with ChatGPT technology, users can have the experience of chatting directly with Caryn herself, and can also get a 24-hour "instant reply" experience.

Replacing Caryn in the above introduction with "Hanzo" would not seem abrupt at all. Even the two used similar statements when explaining why they created AI versions or digital clones. Caryn said that the AI ​​version of herself can help fans "cure loneliness", and Hanzo also said that "(the little man on the screen can) accompany my family and friends on my behalf."

The difference is that Caryn AI charges one dollar per minute. According to the American magazine Fortune, Caryn AI earned $71,600 (about 509,000 RMB) in one week during the testing phase, and its annual income may reach 400 million RMB. However, there is no clear income information for Hanzo's digital clones. Only media estimates show that if there are 10,000 paying users in the emotional mode, Hanzo's clones can earn 720,000 yuan a year, and if there are 10,000 paying users in the super mode, the annual income can reach 3.6 million yuan.

Zibo Duck Head Brother sells goods through live streaming in order to quickly realize cash

The traffic of internet celebrities comes and goes quickly, and seizing the bonus period to quickly realize cash is the best option for many internet celebrities. In the past, internet celebrities would mostly invest in live streaming to realize cash, and now, with the success of Caryn AI, internet celebrities have another way to realize cash.

However, it is not so easy to use the companionship economy to harvest fans. In the comment section of "Hanzo"'s Weibo, some fans questioned the payment and said, "Our friendship should be measured by money?" The problems of Hanzo's clone's unsmooth voice, mechanical replies, and stiff expressions in the video also discouraged many fans. Some fans who paid began to regret, "The experience is too bad, I would not have paid if I had known."

Before the debate on AI legal theory arises, the biggest problem that influencers and companies need to solve if they want to monetize the companionship economy is user experience.

Author: Wang Zhan

Source: WeChat official account: "E-commerce Online (ID: dianshangmj)"