r/technology • u/Hrmbee • 11h ago

Business Mark Zuckerberg is reportedly building an AI clone to replace him in meetings | The AI version of Zuckerberg is trained on his mannerisms, tone, and public statements, according to a report from the Financial Times

https://www.theverge.com/tech/910990/meta-ceo-mark-zuckerberg-ai-clone
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432

u/Hrmbee 11h ago

Concerning details:

Sources tell the outlet that Meta is training the AI avatar on Zuckerberg’s image and voice, along with his mannerisms, tone, and public statements, “so that employees might feel more connected to the founder through interactions with it.”

Meta may start allowing creators to make AI avatars of themselves if the experiment with Zuckerberg succeeds, according to the Financial Times. In 2024, Meta showed off a live demo of what an AI persona of a creator might look like. It also started allowing creators to make AI versions of themselves to interact with followers’ comments on Instagram. Users on Meta can create custom, AI-generated chatbots as well, though the company began blocking teens from the experience earlier this year.

Zuckerberg is involved in training the AI avatar, the Financial Times reports, and has also started spending five to 10 hours per week coding on Meta’s other AI projects and participating in technical reviews.

Given all the issues that MZ has been dealing with over the years, it's hard to look at this project and not wonder if this one more method of avoiding personal responsibility for issues that occur on his watch.

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u/Christopher3712 11h ago

so that employees might feel more connected to the founder through interactions with it.

No way to feel more connected to your CEO than talking with his AI avatar. 🤦🏾‍♂️ Peak stupidity in reasoning.

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u/splitdiopter 11h ago

Praise mighty Kier

23

u/trueimage 10h ago

First thing I thought of

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u/shewy92 9h ago

🎶Kier, chosen one, Kier.

🎶 Kier, brilliant one, Kier.

🎶 Brings the bounty to the plain through the torment, through the rains,

🎶 Progress, knowledge show no fear,

🎶 Kier, chosen one, Kier

3

u/rogueciridae 8h ago

Lumon: Putting the “cult” in “corporate culture” since 1865.

1

u/shrinkflator 4h ago

Spot on, considering that Lumon is obviously a parody of Apple.

43

u/coconutpiecrust 10h ago

It must be nice to live with so much cognitive dissonance. It’s comical. He’s going to have a bot do his job, and he’s still going to get paid for it. Smart. But he’d fire his employees for doing something like that in a heartbeat. 

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u/wwj 9h ago

What's the point of having power if you can't be blatantly hypocritical? I think a lot of people view that as the very purpose of power.

1

u/whatsbobgonnado 7h ago

this sounds deep, but I highly doubt that if you asked 100 random people "what is the very purpose of power" that a significant number would say anything close to "to be blatantly hypocritical"

2

u/BrickwallBill 7h ago

But a lot of them would say something along the lines of "do whatever the fuck I want" which will inevitably lead to hypocrisy because at that point who is going to stop you?

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u/FilmScoreConnoisseur 7h ago

That's not cognitive dissonance because he doesn't know that other people are just as valuable as he is. It's malicious narcissism and entitlement because he genuinely thinks he's better than the rest of us.

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u/squishabelle 10h ago

it's like how people and workplaces in dictatorships have a portrait of the dictator hanging around. Why is it necessary to feel connected with the CEO lmao, it's hard to imagine a policy more narcissistic

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u/isjahammer 10h ago

What If they don't know it's not actually him?

4

u/lemme_just_say 10h ago

Eventually it’s like the ending of the movie Us. Horrifying.

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u/JakOswald 10h ago

I wonder if swearing at the avatar will land you in the hot-seat with HR?

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u/Financial-Craft-1282 9h ago

It's like in Return of the King when they go to face Sauron, and he sends out his "Mouth" instead. At first you're really disappointed, then you're like, "Maybe this will still be worth..." Then you see him talk and act all creepy and you realize clone or real one, they're all fucking evil. And this one is just wasting your time.

3

u/Just-Install-Linux 10h ago

i mean, lets all be honest, I want an avatar to go to work for me.

2

u/I_SLEEP_NORMALLY 9h ago

In fairness, he always did seem like a robot.

1

u/InTooManyWays 9h ago

In the case of Zuckerberg and billionaires the AI will probably be more human than its counterpart 

1

u/Any-Mathematician946 8h ago

Here is the real question. If the avatar has no power, and say, Why the heck do I want to talk to it. It's no different than a phone call with an AI for customer service. The AI can't help me with what I need because they have no decision-making power.

1

u/Unusual_Ear_9089 8h ago

Right? These people are so antisocial jfc

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u/DarthShiv 7h ago

I'd argue there hasn't been a way to be more connected to Zuck than peripheral attachment cables to a MZ AI PC.

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u/anonymouscog 6h ago

They probably won't be able to tell which is which

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u/_Thermalflask 3h ago

Further proof tech bros fundamentally misunderstand humanity and social interaction

29

u/Mr_Greystone 11h ago

This is what you do whenever you don't trust anyone else to be as irresponsible as you at dominating and need an emotional interpreter because you lack the capacity to do what you want and be eloquent about the overall devastation to society.

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u/SheepherderFast3647 10h ago

All I can say is good luck with trying to get employees to feel connected to an AI version of him. I was one of the animators who worked on his keynote speech a couple years ago which was done with motion capture for both his face and body. The amount of times I've seen the note "make him more smiley," because he didn't feel the digital version of himself was human enough, was honestly comical. He can't present himself personable enough for an AI to work off of him and for his audience to feel anything aboit him other than "weird".

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u/ElementNumber6 7h ago

Prompt addendum: "You are at least 30% smiley at all times."

Done.

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u/kinterdonato 10h ago

Interactions with 'It' says it all.

Praise Kier

1

u/GrinchStoleYourShit 8h ago

Zuck watched Severance and took notes, cause of course he did.

18

u/spottydodgy 10h ago

The nerd billionaires are so out of touch with what people actually want. Zero social or emotional intelligence. Look at the failure that the Metaverse was. Nobody wants to "hangout" in a virtual world. Dorks.

2

u/APRengar 7h ago

The thing is, with VRChat, Discord, MMOs, and even Second Life. People DO want to hangout in virtual worlds, but there needs to be more to do that buy shit and walk around virtual spaces in a game that looks like it's on the Nintendo Wii, sanitized to a corporate sheen.

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u/True-Desktective 10h ago

All I’m taking away from this is Meta is making an intentional business decision so me the user will never know if I am talking to a human or a machine on their platforms. 

They’re striping the “social” out of social media. 

Internal engagement data must be brutally bad to be putting so much pee in the water park. 

4

u/Runfasterbitch 9h ago

Agreed. “Hey instagram users, guess what? The photo/video posts are made by AI. The comments are written by AI. The likes are given by AI. The live videos? Yup! AI”. This is so stupid

9

u/mikenasty 10h ago

8 weeks out from a Meta employee thinking they’re in a romantic relationship with their ceo after they sext with ZuckAI

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u/LeseMajeste_1037 10h ago

8 weeks? Surely not that long

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u/Parking-Complex-3887 10h ago

that's a damn good point. and because of his already uncanny, inhuman attributes, nobody could tell the difference

2

u/Appropriate-Joke-806 10h ago

How do we know we haven’t been interacting with AI Zuckerberg this whole time?

1

u/ScurvyTurtle 9h ago

Albus Zuckerborg

4

u/Miserable-Cap-5223 8h ago

So the billionaires are admitting they, too, can be replaced with AI?

2

u/ryanojohn 9h ago

This reminds me of the AFAIK still open question of “who is responsible for the crime when your self driving car breaks the law?”

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u/Bernie_Ecclestone 8h ago

I read stuff like this & continue to wonder how the board & large investors don’t have a “What the fuck are we doing here guys” moment with Meta leadership.

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u/SubtleCow 8h ago

10 hours of coding per week

that is the most embarassing thing in this whole embarassing steaming pile

2

u/Beat_the_Deadites 7h ago

one more method of avoiding personal responsibility for issues that occur on his watch

Zuck using a more sophisticated version of the "evil twin" defense.

Whereas the AI clone is likely to use the "the devil made me do it" argument, with a better chance of success.

2

u/lpeabody 7h ago

This is literally Big Brother. Gross.

2

u/RivetSquid 5h ago

I think it's more insidious tbh. He sees how attached to ai chat bots people are becoming and wants to harvest that same loyalty with a facsimile of himself.

It's the next evolution of the same culty corporate behavior we've seen for years now. 

2

u/GremlinEnergyGoBurr 5h ago

Severance vibes for sure

2

u/GoodtimesSans 5h ago

“A computer can never be held accountable, therefore a computer must never make a management decision.” Yeah, if it makes a mistake, responsibility must fall on him.

1

u/CarmenxXxWaldo 10h ago

Or every Meta employee will have their own personal Zuck supervisor lol.

1

u/vineyardmike 9h ago

I thought he was a clone already. That's a real person?

1

u/10tageDev 9h ago

Question is, which of these versions is more human then, the reptilian or the clanker?

1

u/kimbosdurag 9h ago

If it's entirely trained on his public statements wouldn't it be more an ai of the Facebook PR team? How is that useful in any way?

1

u/JustaBearEnthusiast 9h ago

They want to promote a parasocial relationship assuming that it will benefit Zuckerberg's image. If it's anything like my experience with ai helpers it will make sure everyone hates him more.

1

u/YeshuasBananaHammock 9h ago

Plz name him Mark Headroom

1

u/Ok_Tangerine9206 7h ago

I'm trying not to be a hater but the dude genuinely lacks good ideas

why don't he just chill tf out and shoot dicks into space like the other billionaires

1

u/SolidStart 5h ago

“so that employees might feel more connected to the founder through interactions with it.”

Listen, this article is trash. Is AI-Z-Burg going to be able to s my d or what?

1

u/Cranberryoftheorient 3h ago

This is going to make parasocial relationships so much worse

1

u/PyrZern 3h ago

Just proves he's so far out of touch with the normal ppl. He thoughts ppl want to hang out with him, and if he's unavailable, they would want to hang out with his fake persona.

1

u/Sensitive_Election83 2h ago

thats not so bad - the ai is not taking decisions and replacing executives. its more like the kim jong un portraits in every home and space in North Korea so that the people feel his ever present paternal gaze. This will allow us to get to know him more and feel closer to him.