‘She never sleeps': This platform wants to be OnlyFans for the AI era
OhChat is an eight-month-old startup that uses artificial intelligence to build lifelike digital doubles of public figures. (Andrew Brookes/via CNN Newsource)
She doesn't eat, sleep or breathe. But she remembers you, desires you and never logs off.
Her name is Jordan – the AI-powered 'digital twin' of former British glamor model Katie Price – and people can pay her to act out their 'uncensored dreams.'
'You couldn't get any more human. It's like looking at me years ago,' Price, who shot to fame in the late 1990s as a peroxide-blonde tabloid model and Playboy cover star, told CNN. 'It's my voice. It's literally me. It's me.'
On June 9, she joined the ranks of creators, celebrities and AI-generated avatars to be digitally immortalized by OhChat, an eight-month-old startup that uses artificial intelligence to build lifelike digital doubles of public figures. Its patrons can live out their 'spicy fantasies' through these AI avatars, OhChat's Instagram page states. The platform has attracted 200,000 users, most of which are based in the United States.
OhChat sits at the provocative intersection of AI, fame and fantasy – where intimacy is simulated and connection is monetized. It goes a step further than platforms such as OnlyFans, where users pay to gain access to adult content from content creators.
It also comes amid growing ethical concerns around AI – from its role in how people earn a living to how they form intimate connections – underscoring questions about whether AI companies are doing enough to ensure the technology isn't being misused.
'This creates exactly the right environment for the human to be left behind completely - while still being exploited,' Eleanor Drage, a senior research fellow at the University of Cambridge's Leverhulme Centre for the Future of Intelligence, told CNN.
A 'lovechild between OnlyFans and OpenAI'
OhChat CEO Nic Young described the platform as the 'lovechild between OnlyFans and OpenAI,' in an exclusive interview with CNN. Once activated, the avatars run autonomously, offering 'infinite personalized content' for subscribers. Jordan, for example, is marketed on the platform as 'the ultimate British bombshell.'
The tiered subscription model allows users to pay US$4.99 per month for unlimited texts on demand, $9.99 for capped access to voice notes and images, or $29.99 for unlimited VIP interaction.
Price, like other creators on the platform, receives an 80 per cent cut from the revenue her AI avatar generates, according to Young. OhChat will keep the remaining 20 per cent.
'You have literally unlimited passive income without having to do anything again,' Young told CNN.
The platform 'is an incredibly powerful tool, and tools can be used however the human behind it wants to be used,' he added. 'We could use this in a really scary way, but we're using it in a really, I think, good, exciting way.'
Since launching OhChat in October 2024, the company has signed 20 creators – including 'Baywatch' actress Carmen Electra. Some of the creators are already earning thousands of dollars per month, Young said.
'It takes away the opportunity cost of time,' he told CNN. 'Just don't touch it at all and receive money into your bank account.'
To build a digital twin, OhChat asks creators to submit 30 images of themselves and speak to a bot for 30 minutes. The platform can then generate the digital replica 'within hours' using Meta's large language model, according to Young.
Katie Price
Price, seen here in 2024, shot to fame in the late 1990s as glamor model called Jordan. (Hannah Young/Shutterstock via CNN Newsource)
Price's AI avatar is trained to mimic her voice, appearance and mannerisms. Jordan can 'sext' users, send voice notes and images, and provide on-demand intimacy at scale – all without Price lifting a finger.
'They had to get my movements, my characteristics, my personality,' said Price, who described her digital twin as 'scarily fascinating.'
Price's avatar is categorized as 'level two' out of four on the platform's internal scale, which ranks the intensity and explicitness of their interactions. 'Level two' means sexualized chats and topless imagery, but not full nudity or simulated sex acts. Creators contributing to the platform decide which level their avatar will be.
Price told CNN that creating a digital version of herself has left her feeling 'empowered.' The digital twin offers a round-the-clock connection that even her subscription-based OnlyFans account cannot match, she said.
'Obviously, I sleep, whereas she doesn't go to sleep; she's available,' she said.
Ethical questions
The rise of AI avatars like Jordan invites deeper scrutiny into a new frontier of digital labor and desire – where creators risk being replaced by their own likeness, fans may be vulnerable to forming emotional attachments to simulations, and platforms profit from interactions that feel real but remain one-sided.
Sandra Wachter, professor of technology and regulation at the University of Oxford, questioned whether it is 'socially beneficial to incentivize and monetize human-computer interaction masquerading as emotional discourse.'
Her remarks reflect concerns around emotional dependence on AI companions. While OhChat is for adults, it enters an ecosystem already grappling with the consequences of synthetic intimacy.
Last year, a lawsuit involving Character.AI drew global attention after the mother of a teenager alleged that her son died by suicide following a relationship with the platform's chatbot. Elsewhere, social media users have gone viral describing ChatGPT 'boyfriends' and emotional bonds with such digital entities designed to mimic human affection.
'It's all algorithmic theatre: an illusion of reciprocal relationship where none actually exists,' said Toby Walsh, a professor of artificial intelligence at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia.
OhChat strikes what Young called a 'balance between immersion and transparency,' when asked whether users are informed that they are speaking with AI instead of a real person.
OhChat is 'clearly not presenting itself as an in-person or real experience,' he said. 'It isn't in the users' interest to be reminded overtly that this is all AI, but we're very clear about that upfront and in the entire experience and offering of the platform.'
But it's in Young's interests to keep users hooked on the platform with personalities like 'Jordan,' even if she isn't real, says Walsh.
'These platforms profit from engagement,' he told CNN, 'which means the AI is optimized to keep users coming back, spending more time and likely more money.'
Éamon Chawke, a partner at the intellectual property law firm Briffa, notes that there are risks for creators' reputations as well, especially for high-profile figures like Price and Electra.
'Vulnerable fan users may become overly attached to avatars of their heroes and become addicted,' Chawke told CNN. 'And if their avatar is hacked or hallucinates and says something offensive, reputational harm to the public figure is likely.'
While Young says ethics 'can be a hard thing to define in this industry,' he said the platform operates within 'a hell of a lot of strong boundaries.'
Young said OhChat uses safeguards that build on those used by Meta's Facebook – which has struggled to control content its own platform in the past. Each creator signs an agreement outlining the exact behavioral rules for their digital twin, he said, including the level of sexual content permitted. Avatars can also be revoked or deleted at any time, he added.
'It's within their control and at their sole discretion whether or when to ever stop their digital twin, or delete it,' he told CNN.
But Young is prepared to face the tough questions; in his vision of the future, digital duplicates will be the norm.
'I can't imagine a future where every creator doesn't have a digital twin,' he said. 'I think it just will be the case, with absolute certainty, that every single creator and celebrity will have an AI version of themselves, and we want to be the layer that makes that happen.'
By Olivia Kemp.
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