A billboard appearing to advertise an AI chatbot has appeared in San Francisco. Its name is 'ChatTJB'. The advertisement, composed primarily of black and white, features the phrase 'The leading chat interface powered by AI'. However, the service is actually operated not by an AI model, but by a single person.
ChatTJB was created by Tucker Bryant, a former Google employee, artist, and speaker. When a user enters a question on the site, Bryant personally reads the content and provides an answer. If an image is requested, he draws it himself. While it features a chat interface similar to ChatGPT, its response speed and accuracy depend on a single person's time and knowledge.
Bryant launched ChatTJB last April, and user numbers surged after spending $6,000 to install a billboard in San Francisco in July. As of August 6, the cumulative number of questions exceeded 30,000, with approximately 5,000 questions received per hour at its peak. Since then, verified volunteers have also begun participating in providing answers to some of the responses.
The project began as an art project addressing the attitude of easily trusting answers when using AI. Bryant used the AI-based website creation tool Lovable to build the site. Rather than rejecting AI technology itself, the structure utilizes the familiar chatbot interface to demonstrate how user expectations change depending on who is providing the answer.
More and Sources
