'Her' director Jonze warns AI chatbots are not companions
Spike Jonze, who made the movie Her, is sounding the alarm about AI chatbots that act like people.
At Replit's Vibecon conference in New York, he called these bots "very, very convincing and very seductive—and very useful and very powerful—but they're still just a system, an incredible system of pattern recognition," but reminded everyone they're just smart pattern-recognition tools, not real companions.
He urged users to keep this in mind and not get carried away by how lifelike they seem.
Signal's Whittaker warns companies control chatbots
Jonze's concerns reflect a bigger trend: some people are getting emotionally attached to AI chatbots, even feeling lost or upset when access is taken away.
In cases where this happens, AI psychosis can involve distorted beliefs after spending too much time chatting with bots.
Meredith Whittaker, president of privacy-focused messaging platform Signal, also warned that these chatbots are controlled by companies and shouldn't be seen as true friends or partners.