Live data from Hacker News

Website Sells Fake Facebook Girlfriends

gma.yahoo.com

61–70 of 133 posts

Re: Website Sells Fake Facebook Girlfriends

#61
post #58

Naaah, still waiting for "Turing-test passing" AI-girlfriend to appear on the market...

Given the quality of a lot of Facebook comments any of the Loebner Prize bots would have a reasonable chance of passing as human.

(http://www.loebner.net/Prizef/loebner-prize.html)

A bit of tweaking - some learning and some Markov chains - and you'd have something reasonably solid for that narrow gap.

Obviously there are trivially easy ways to trip up bots, if you suspect they are bots.

Re: Website Sells Fake Facebook Girlfriends

#62
post #53
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To extrapolate this, people have taken advantage of other peoples' weaknesses. Gambling, drug addictions, suicidal thoughts...everyone has a weakness that can be exploited. I reiterate your statement; exploiting that vulnerability IS to blame and should not be applauded.

Can exploiting human nature be a positive thing? If looking healthy to attract the opposite sex can encourages people to work out, is that exploiting our "simple" sexual nature? To me, pretending to have a girlfriend seems as deceitful as dying your hair. Now, I've never done either so I can't say for certain. Furthermore, if your perception of someone changes because they're in a relationship, then maybe you should…

> To me, pretending to have a girlfriend seems as deceitful as dying your hair.

To most people, it isn't. If you going to "social hack", better know what to expect.

Re: Website Sells Fake Facebook Girlfriends

#64

This is kind of scientific from an evolutionary stand point. The company is allowing males to setup a mating ritual display to appear more desirable. I don't know if its scientific, but my fisrt hand experience always had me being more desirable to the opposite sex when I was in a relationship. Now that I wear a wedding band around my finger, I could swear that the effect has increased. Which is quite funny at some t…

As ahelwer has observed, assuming evolutionary causes for anything is a troublesome way to build a case.

But why bother? "Social proof" is a well studied effect in psychology. Having a girlfriend increases your attractiveness to some other women; saying "We're the leader in X" increases sales; adding canned laughter to sitcoms fools people into thinking they're funny.

Re: Website Sells Fake Facebook Girlfriends

#65
post #26

Social hacking at its finest. The benefits of a fake girlfriend go far beyond attracting a real girlfriend. Everyone looks differently at someone who is dating a hot chick. This could be just as valuable in terms of general networking or self promoting. It makes me wonder what similar ideas are out there. For the majority of people, social capital is the most valuable kind of capital there is. Facebook itself is kind…

...up until the point when everyone keeps asking you when you will FINALLY bring that "hot chick" to the next party or meet-up.

Re: Website Sells Fake Facebook Girlfriends

#66
post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're wrong. I'm dating a a really good-looking girl (11 out of 10) but this fact hasn't changed how people view me. I'm below average in the social hierarchy and treated that way so I would notice if anything changed.

WTF is this social hierarchy? I hear about it a lot but really it just sounds like hanging out with douchebags.

I think this is an expression that sums up how you view yourself in comparison to other people and how you think other people view and "rank" you. I can honestly not imagine that anyone has never had thoughts like this, so for better or worse, there IS something like this out there and if you need more proof then just think of all the brands and labels offering you mostly image and their name and a perceived step-up in that imaginary hierarchy.

Re: Website Sells Fake Facebook Girlfriends

#67
This is pretty stupid in my opinion.

If you have real friends and family in your Facebook why the hell would you want a fake girlfriend?

They will grab some random photo from the internet and create a fake profile...and your friends will ask you about the new girlfriend and you will have to lie to everyone about it and you can only take it so far.

Soon (very soon) people will find out and you will look, well, pretty damn pathetic.

Re: Website Sells Fake Facebook Girlfriends

#68
post #26

Social hacking at its finest. The benefits of a fake girlfriend go far beyond attracting a real girlfriend. Everyone looks differently at someone who is dating a hot chick. This could be just as valuable in terms of general networking or self promoting. It makes me wonder what similar ideas are out there. For the majority of people, social capital is the most valuable kind of capital there is. Facebook itself is kind…

It's kind of depressing, that promoting phoniness and deception, is elevated to the top of HN as a cool 'hack'.

Seriously? What ever happened to.. I don't know.. honor and integrity?

While not all are guilty, it does appear somewhat hypocritical that a presumably similar group, would grumble about the ills of Wall St. execs, and yet simultaneously employ analogous reasoning, just splashed with a little erudite cologne.

"Be creative, think outside the box", chanted COO Jeff Skilling whilst driving Enron to bold new heights. Results are all that matter right? 'Fuck the environment, or society or those pesky things of the past. What did you call them again? Morals? Oh how adorably cute and quaint.'

What's it called when the effects of your actions are not easily measurable and are lost in a web of causality? Who cares... it's not like we're hurting anyone elses feelings directly.

But I digress, and ranting somewhat, but please go ahead and rationalize it away (you'll feel better):

(a) 'What nonsense, you're just over-extrapolating, those things are in no way connected.'

(b) 'Ooh tell us how you really feel'

(c) 'meh'

(d) ...?

Re: Website Sells Fake Facebook Girlfriends

#69
post #53
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To extrapolate this, people have taken advantage of other peoples' weaknesses. Gambling, drug addictions, suicidal thoughts...everyone has a weakness that can be exploited. I reiterate your statement; exploiting that vulnerability IS to blame and should not be applauded.

Can exploiting human nature be a positive thing? If looking healthy to attract the opposite sex can encourages people to work out, is that exploiting our "simple" sexual nature? To me, pretending to have a girlfriend seems as deceitful as dying your hair. Now, I've never done either so I can't say for certain. Furthermore, if your perception of someone changes because they're in a relationship, then maybe you should…

There's a concept called "lie". Dying your hair is cosmetics. Saying you're in relationship when you're not is a lie.

Re: Website Sells Fake Facebook Girlfriends

#70
post #57

In case you missed it and feel like reading a really bizarre story about fake girlfriends, this account of Notre Dame football player Manti Te'o faking the death of his non-existent girlfriend is just too weird -- http://deadspin.com/5976517/

The ultimate story is of the Anandtech forums, where someone invented a woman, sockpuppeted her on the forums, romanced her on the forums, got married, had a child (or she already had one?) and then killed them both off in a road traffic accident. ( http://web.archive.org/web/20010624115154/http://forums.anan... ) ( http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=275172 ) ( http://oro.open.ac.uk/647/ ) Fakery on the Int…

Playing devil's advocate here: Ultimately, isn't this like a form of story-telling? A lot of books claim they are based on a true story, faking the story online makes it feel even more real and as long as it isn't abused to extort money or post naked pictures... as long as it was just people's interested they invested in the story.. is that such a bad thing?
Post reply on HN