The man who turned his dead father into a chatbot

In 2016, James Vlahos faced heartbreaking news – his father received a terminal cancer diagnosis.
“I loved my dad, I was losing my dad,” recalls James, based in Oakland, California.
Determined to cherish the time he had left with his father, James embarked on an oral history project, spending countless hours audio recording his father’s life story. This endeavor coincided with James’ burgeoning interest in AI, prompting him to ponder the possibility of creating something interactive from the recordings.
“I thought, gosh, what if I could make something interactive out of this?” he muses. “For a way to more richly keep his memories, and some sense of his personality, which was so wonderful, to keep that around.”
Although James’ father, John, passed away in 2017, James had transformed the recorded memories into an AI-powered chatbot capable of answering questions about his dad’s life – in his father’s voice.
While the concept of using AI to emulate deceased loved ones has long been explored in science fiction, advancements in AI technology have brought it into reality. In 2019, James launched HereafterAI, allowing users to create similar chatbots for their own departed loved ones.
James acknowledges that while the chatbot doesn’t erase the pain of his father’s death, it provides him with solace and an interactive repository of memories to cherish.
Meanwhile, South Korea’s DeepBrain AI takes this concept further by creating video-based avatars of deceased individuals, capturing their likeness, voice, and mannerisms with striking accuracy.
“We are cloning the person’s likeness to 96.5% of the similarity of the original person,” explains Michael Jung, DeepBrain’s chief financial officer. “So mostly the family don’t feel uncomfortable talking with the deceased family member, even though it is an AI avatar.”
DeepBrain envisions its technology as part of a “well dying” culture, where individuals prepare for death in advance, leaving behind a living legacy of family histories and memories.
However, this technology comes at a significant cost, with users paying up to $50,000 (£39,000) for the filming process and avatar creation. Despite the steep price tag, investors remain bullish on its potential, evident in DeepBrain’s substantial fundraising success, having raised $44m in its last funding round.
Source: bbc.com

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