This AI Chatbot Was Just One Busy Guy, and He Has Hit His Limit

The early history of AI will be remembered for the rise and fall of many chatbot services. Remember Microsoft Tay ? Maybe it’s best if you don’t.

But one interesting footnote in that history will be the rapid ascent of ChatTJB , a chatbot service with a twist. Its creator, an artist named Tucker Bryant , was answering all the questions submitted himself. That means a human was responding to literally thousands of queries, including sending quick human-generated drawings, to people who used the service after seeing a San Francisco billboard Bryant paid $6,000 to put up in late July , as Wired reported.

Now, after ChatTJB went viral, Bryant put out a call for volunteers to serve as AI (“Average Individuals”) to keep the project sustainable and has paused questions on the site while he regroups. Bryant created a $5 donation tier called “ChatTJB Pro,” but is now begging visitors not to subscribe to it.

As he writes on the website, “i actively discourage you from subscribing to it because it is a stupid and worthless tier that only exists to give my fingers a break and help me pay off that ridiculous billboard if anyone was planning on literally like burning five dollars for tinder.”

“It’ll come back, at least temporarily, in the short term,” he said. “In the long-term, the site needs more support than I can give it since I don’t intend for this to become my full-time job, but if the right partner shows up, I’d love for it to keep going. “

Bypassing the paused ChatTJB website entirely, Tucker took time to answer some questions from CNET over email:

CNET: You’ve answered so many questions already from so many people — what is the question people ask most frequently, and what’s your typical answer to that?

Tucker Bryant: The most frequent question has been along the lines of “why are you doing this?” I’ve sort of alternated between two answers: The high-brow answer has been to encourage people to stay curious about their, and the world’s, relationship to technology at a time when AI is doing incredible things, but may also be changing our perceptions and behavior in ways it’s healthy for us to stay aware of. The other answer has been that I thought it would be really funny. Both answers are equally true.

When the Wired story was published, you’d only gotten four donations totaling $20. Has that upticked at all with the additional attention? Will you be able to pay off the billboard and make a living at this, maybe?

I’m really grateful to the people who’ve supported the project! That said, I’ve made less than $300 in donations and subscriptions to ChatTJB Pro (which explicitly adds no features whatsoever and is just a tip jar with a satirical name), so I certainly haven’t paid off the billboard or the cost of running the site.

Ultimately, that’s OK, because I really just wanted to start a conversation with this project and hopefully make some people smile in the process. Since this isn’t the work that pays me — and because it has been pretty taxing on a few levels — I’m still thinking of it as one short-term art project among several that I want to have room for.