[0_____0]

> ... get the attention they want, minimal effort

I...uh, have you asked a woman whether this is true? Like, ask the nearest woman to confirm this and report back.

Most women I have spoken to about this can get attention generally, but very little of it is desirable attention.

There's also a bias I've noticed where people don't consider women that they don't personally find attractive when talking about these things - they're basically invisible.

[sho_hn]

You find this "Women don't have this problem! They can have a relationship whenever they want" sentiment in so many conversations on Hacker News, and it's so unempathetic.

The premise is not true for many women. And even if it were, it's not necessarily any easier to get attention from someone you are interested in yourself. And women have to deal with social anxiety, fears of making themselves vulnerable, self-confidence, body image, etc. around pursuing or initiating relationships just as anyone.

I think this is based in people misreading dating app metrics or something, and completely neglects trying to imagine what life is like for the person.

[JambalayaJim]

So how do you explain the discrepancy in these ads? Or the fact that men are more likely to pay on dates, dating apps, or join apps generally?

No one is suggesting that young women don’t struggle whatsoever. What they are suggesting, is that they don’t struggle to the extent that most would consider buying a paid AI companion.

[whichfawkes]

I'm empathetic to the struggles faced by women. That said, I also realize that those struggles are different than the ones faced by men.

Yes, I believe that women experience this particular problem less than men do, but that doesn't mean that women don't have just as many problems on balance.

The patriarchy is alive and well, and I'm pretty sure it's still harder to be a woman than it is to be a man.

But, if you want to examine why men are expected to be more likely to pay for intimate relationships with AI, I think this area is relevant to the discussion.

[antisthenes]

> Like, ask the nearest woman to confirm this and report back.

You can test this yourself trivially on any dating app pretending to be a woman. In fact this is the purest form of the test, because there's 0 chance of anyone else misreporting their experiences.

> Most women I have spoken to about this can get attention generally, but very little of it is desirable attention.

I think in the dating market, most attention for both sexes is undesirable. However, since women receive comparatively more attention, they are much more likely to receive at least some attention that is desirable.

> There's also a bias I've noticed where people don't consider women that they don't personally find attractive when talking about these things - they're basically invisible.

Wait till you find out how big that bias is in the other direction.

[commandlinefan]

> very little of it is desirable attention

that doesn't contradict what he said - just that the "undesirable" attention is still more desirable than an AI boyfriend could offer. Whereas an AI girlfriend can tautologically offer more desirable attention than the zero attention a significant percentage of men are able to achieve.

[sho_hn]

I think a lot of people (be they men or women) might feel more comfortable with being vulnerable and less afraid of being judged, or their secrets and thoughts being exposed or somehow used against them, with AIs than with real people, whether those real people are accessible/attainable for them or not. Perhaps, knowing deep down that it's not real and doesn't have a motive is a feature.

Whether they should be more comfortable (given the privacy problems with these services) is a different matter.

[whichfawkes]

Sufficiently compromised privacy in conjunction with sufficiently sophisticated data markets starts to look a lot like "having a motive", eventually...

How long before your AI girlfriend is sussing out your feelings and desires in the interest of figuring out how you can most effectively be advertised to?

[AISnakeOil]

How does one discern between undesirable and desirable attention?

Asking for a friend.

[lcnPylGDnU4H9OF]

It's the difference between a stalker and a secret admirer. The person receiving the attention decides its desirability.

[0_____0]

Is your friend socially masculine, feminine, or neither? Because it changes the answer.

[dahwolf]

Just be handsome and rich.

[luckman212]

better not be short either

[sergiomattei]

Thank you for speaking what’s on my mind.

It’s shameful that this self-deprecating idea seems to have made it to the mainstream, and even worse that young men are believing it.