Character.ai was launched in September 2022, it is an AI chatbot that lets you assign a character and personality to the chatbot, and it takes on that particular character. It can be someone from your life or a celebrity. Meta also has chatbots that are based on celebrities such as Tom Brady, Paris Hilton, Snoop Dogg. Google is now trying to do exactly this with Gemini. According to a report by The Information, Google is creating AI chatbots that are based on celebrities and YouTube influencers. This means that when a user interacts with the chatbot, it will be like talking to a celebrity. Operating the said chatbot will be Gemini LLM.

According to the report, the company is working closely with influencers and celebrities for this. According to the report, apart from adopting the celebrity’s character, the chatbot will also allow users to create personalized chatbots by detailing their qualities and looks. Again, similar to Character.ai.

Now here are some interesting things you should know. In November 2023, a Reuters report revealed that Google plans to invest “hundreds of millions of dollars” in character.AI. Meanwhile, Google is already partnering with character.ai. At Google I/O 2024 last year, the company announced that it was working with the AI ​​startup, and the latter uses Google Cloud and its technology to make its platform more powerful. At the time, it was unclear what Google got from the partnership, but now we know.

Fun fact No. 2: The AI ​​chatbot startup, Character.ai, was founded by former Google employees Noam Shazir and Daniel de Freitas.

Coming back to celebrity chatbots, note that this is just something Google is trying out right now. Google hasn’t confirmed it yet, and it hasn’t even rolled out to Google Labs yet. Even if and when it rolls out to Google Labs, there’s no guarantee that it will be rolled out to the general public. It could just remain an experimental product. Google does that all the time. And Google shuts down products all the time.

But that’s beside the point. The point is, we want to see why Google chose to do something that character.ai and Meta AI are already offering, especially when both aren’t as popular as you’d think, considering that the model gives you a chance to interact with a celebrity. With the Gemini app and Gemini Advanced coming to India with access to multiple Indian languages, it will be interesting to see this particular celebrity chatbot model being tested with the Indian audience. Imagine chatting with Shah Rukh Khan or Pankaj Tripathi!