"}The smartphone app Replika lets users \ncreate chatbots, powered by machine learning, that can carry on \nalmost-coherent text conversations. Technically, the chatbots can serve \nas something approximating a friend or mentor, but the app\u2019s breakout \nsuccess has resulted from letting users create on-demand romantic and \nsexual partners \u2014 a vaguely dystopian feature that\u2019s inspired an endless series of provocative headlines.
Replika\n has also picked up a significant following on Reddit, where members \npost interactions with chatbots created on the app. A grisly trend has \nemerged there: users who create AI partners, act abusively toward them, \nand post the toxic interactions online.