Imagine not only never needing to connect with real people in the real world, but also no longer needing to find actual people on social media to connect with in the first place. A new app called SocialAI offers users a platform to create posts and have AI-generated accounts like, comment, and respond to you. It’s like Twitter, but, you know, even faker.

The app was designed to serve as “a sounding board” for your ideas. Since actual sounding boards composed of real people seem to be in short supply these days, SocialAI looks to be the answer. The designer, Michael Sayman, wrote a lengthy post on X this week about his motivations for creating SocialAI and what he hopes it will accomplish.

I’ve spent years wanting to build a consumer app that was impossible for a long time. Now the tech has finally caught up to my vision. Introducing SocialAI, a private social network where you receive millions of AI-generated comments offering feedback, advice & reflections on each post you make.

Sayman’s vision imitates some of the early hopes for actual social media. We use these platforms to share ourselves and for others to see and hear us. The problem is, when billions of people are doing that every minute of the day, it’s inevitable that egos collide, people compare themselves to other users, and social cohesion begins to fracture. SocialAI seems unapologetic in what it offers: a social media platform that isn’t actually social. It’s all about you. No sacrifice or vulnerability needed. However, this was already true of traditional social media. It’s always been tailored to appeal to the user, not the community. Sayman goes on to say,

SocialAI is designed to help people feel heard, and to give them a space for reflection, support, and feedback that acts like a close-knit community.

This is where Sayman’s vision gets dark, and spells out the problem with so many contemporary AI apps. We’ve started to consider our machines as people, as resources we can use as a substitute for actual human connection. Christine Rosen writes at length about this in her new book The Extinction of Experience. Social media was already a poor substitute for in-person connection, erasing the element of serendipity and proximity real communities need to flourish. AI simply simulates the issue even further. No longer are the avatars hiding real people. Now the accounts lack human identity entirely, created to assuage the user. Moreover, you get to “be the main character.” You can curate your own feedback, who you want to follow, what kind of response you want to receive. Is this a recipe for narcissism? We don’t get to control the feedback we get in real life. Sometimes the feedback can be harsh. People hurt our feelings, look past our shoulders, lose interest. Human connection is fraught with potential and risk. But, you know, it’s better than creating a host of mini-bots to make me feel like I have friends and supporters, when I really don’t.

If we keep designing technologies like this, will it continue to affect how we treat the actual people in our lives? If we treat our machines as persons, will we be ever more tempted to treat persons as machines, designed to give us the feedback we want to hear?

It’s tragic Sayman feels like he lacks the human community he craves. But do we need another app simulating human experience to solve the loneliness crisis? More simulation, evidence and experience shows, entails further disconnection.