Snapchat recently made the My AI feature, powered by Chat GPT, available to all users – but it hasn't been as successful as creators had hoped. The AI chatbot was initially launched in February, but was only available to paid subscribers; since making it available to all, there has been a 488% increase in the search term "delete Snapchat" as people are unhappy with the service.
Launched in 2011, Snapchat started as an image-sharing platform where users could share photos that would then disappear. Over the last 12 years, Snapchat has introduced stories, filters, memories, bitmojis, a snap map (so you can track your contact's location) and most recently an AI bot that you can use to ask questions, help plan activities or tell information about yourself. However, there have been some cases where the AI has had some pretty creepy things to say – resulting in the deletion of the app en masse.
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Research conducted by CloudTech 24 shows that the term "delete Snapchat" has skyrocketed five times more than usual over the last three months – and worldwide the search term "how to delete my Snapchat account" has risen by seventy percent.
Digital Camera World’s Ecommerce editor, Sebastien Oakley, has recently experienced the bizarre functions of Snapchat’s AI bot. "I used to love Snapchat and still use it today for the odd friend here and there, but due to the new AI function and an experience my friend has, I don’t want to touch it.
"My friend agreed to the AI function, not really understanding what it was, and after posting a picture of her with her sister's newborn, it suddenly started asking about her baby. When she asked how did it know she had a baby, it started to backtrack – which is pretty scary stuff."
Other people are complaining that they are unable to unpin My AI from the top of the chat list unless they purchase a Snapchat Plus subscription. While it is intended to be a helpful tool, many users are asking for Snapchat to get rid of the AI bot entirely while others have decided to delete the app altogether.
It seems that you can’t do anything or go anywhere without AI cropping up these days. It has become a major part of photo editing and photo creation, it can be used to write code, create music, isolate vocals from your favorite songs, automate boring tasks, and it’s even started to fool photographers and win photography competitions.
AI is surely a double-edged sword. It’s incredibly powerful and there are some amazing uses for it, but it's also a frightening technology that in the wrong hands could be dangerous.
Snapchat or not, you might also be interested in the best camera phones – or if you're a brand loyalist, the best Samsung phones compared to the best iPhones for photography.
