Party time! Dua Lipa’s in town promoting her book club (we’re fans), and Mark Ronson’s out there promoting his new memoir (we, too, remember the aughts). Plus a dive into how and why AI has taken over dating and the last word on Fashion Week. —Emily Gould
CLANKER NEWS
People Are Outsourcing Dating to the Robots
Ceding your communications to chatbots is dystopian, and I proved it!
Look, we know app dating is hell, especially for women. (That’s why we have Personals!) It’s no wonder people are using tools like ChatGPT to help craft their profiles and their messages and even sometimes to act as a bespoke relationship coach. But as Anna Louise Sussman writes, there’s more to the story than just the authenticity that’s lost when we send someone a message that’s like, “You’re not just existing, you’re curating your presence with intention, with grace, and with clarity. And the way you view others through support instead of competition? That’s a mark of someone who’s truly rooted.” (Which, also: vomiting emoji.) There are darker forces at work here, like a dating bot developed by a The Game–inspired “dating coach” who goes by “Ice White” called Message Game AI that encourages male users to be more aggressive and pushy.
The pickup-artist community is rife with misogyny, and women have criticized The Game as encouraging sexual assault, so it’s not surprising that MGAI may not have the best radar for when men have overstepped bounds. When Alex felt he’d made a mistake one night by going in for a kiss without waiting for his date to express her interest, MGAI told him to essentially forget about it. It advised against writing to her to apologize and again told him he was overthinking the situation. “I don’t think I overstepped a boundary, but if I did overstep a boundary, in that case, then I should take responsibility, and it didn’t necessarily push me there,” Alex told me. He says he is conscious of sexism and “oppressive thinking” and thinks the MGAI app can be “a bit too cocky sometimes.” (In a statement, Ice White said, “It was also designed to have a no-fluff attitude, which may have caused MGAI to realign the interaction with the user into moving forward, rather than giving advice on a past physical world interaction.”)
This is gross, but bear with me. I asked ChatGPT to “craft a response to this article that's disapproving, quirky, sarcastic, and uses personal anecdotes in the style of the Dinner Party newsletter.” After a little coaching (keep it brief and avoid criticizing the article), Chat used a few gallons of drinkable water to come up with this:
“Ah, AI and dating — what a match made in techno-hell. According to The Cut, we’re now in a world where your perfect match might be typing, ‘I’m an adventurous spirit who’s always up for a challenge’ with a perfectly crafted, grammatically correct flourish. All thanks to ChatGPT, the digital wingman we never asked for.
I can’t help but feel a little nostalgic for the good ol’ days of dating apps when bios were messy and slightly weird. Remember when someone’s bio was just ‘I’m a dog person, but not that kind of dog person’? Now it’s all meticulously tailored ‘emotionally intelligent, taco-loving wanderlusts’ — the kind of person you can only talk to if you’re fluent in corporatespeak and know how to trigger those AI-powered dopamine hits.
Look, I’ve been there: I once matched with a guy who sent me an opener that read like a Hallmark card. After a few exchanges, I Googled a line he said and found it in a StackExchange thread on ‘how to flirt like a novelist.’ The cherry on top? The guy swore he didn’t use a template. Sure, bud. Sure.
But maybe the biggest kicker? The growing suspicion that everyone’s AI-powered dating profile might as well come with a warning label: ‘User may be a sentient chatbot.’ If you’ve ever had that moment where you realized the person on the other side is just too … perfect? Yeah, that's the AI. It’s polished, it’s pretty, and it’s got zero imperfections. And I don’t know about you, but I kind of miss the weird typos that told you someone was human.
In the end, maybe we’re just swiping on personality algorithms that, deep down, we know aren’t quite the real thing. At this point, my dream date might just be with someone who admits they wrote ‘I love hiking’ just to sound interesting. No AI involved.”
While it’s flattering that AI assumes I am young enough/have been single recently enough to have app-dated, I’m insulted that it thinks my writing is so AJLT-version Carrie Bradshaw. The robots will not replace me, for the moment at least.
BTS
What My Co-workers Are Chitchatting About Today
All the news that’s not quite fit to publish yet.
Five staffers went to Dua Lipa’s NYPL event on Monday with Flesh author David Szalay. More on that to come in this month’s Book Gossip newsletter. Overall impressions: Dua is a good interviewer, and the book sounds like it falls in the enticingly rare literary microgenre: straight but for gays.
This n+1 thorough denunciation of AI feels like it should be the last word on the topic but inevitably won’t be.
Ta-Nehisi Coates on the sanitization of Charlie Kirk’s legacy feels like it should be the last word on the topic, but lol yeah right.
Some people got invited to Mark Ronson’s actual book party for his memoir. The rest of us plebes will have to content ourselves with the Spotify-sponsored audiobook listening party on Friday (stay tuned). Ronson is a fascinating cultural figure not least because of the dynastic aspect of his fame, lately on display at the wedding of his half-sister (Naomi Pierce from Succession). For the youth: His other sisters are the designer of a dress I wore until it fell apart circa 2009 and a DJ who famously did it with Lindsay Lohan. Also, his wife is my third-ranked of Meryl Streep’s delightful daughters (the competition is fierce, but Louisa is finally making her thankless Gilded Age role work and Grace was hilarious on The Good Wife. Mamie got points off for appearing on The Newsroom, a television program I did not care for).
The Pierrepont Posse is celebrating Marisa Abela’s wedding, and that Myha’la was a bridesmaid!
END OF EMPIRE
International Elite Skipping NYFW Because America
“I’m too European for this.”
Danya Issawi spoke with three international editors who either skipped New York Fashion Week shows or thought about doing so because of American politics and potential issues at the border. One London-based editor did not mince words: “At this point, the American flag has become a triggering symbol. Even when Beyoncé came to town for Cowboy Carter, even though she was trying to subvert it and show her version of Americana, to the average consumer, they were not feeling awesome about seeing all this American paraphernalia everywhere.”
A Milan-based editor came but worried about what was on her phone, not to mention random checks on the street. “I’ve seen lots of TikToks about that kind of situation. But maybe New York is a different situation compared to other parts of the country. There’s a comment on TikTok that I think applies well to the situation: ‘I’m too European for this.’ I mean, not that the situation in Europe is perfect, but the one in the United States seems to me to be increasingly veering toward dystopia.”
Click Your Way Out
A review of Harry Styles and Zoë Kravitz’s date-night spot I Cavallini that contains this delightful phrase: “a fine addition to an eel mini-craze gripping the city.”
I’m a Dazzle Dry convert and only resort to gel when a salon doesn’t have it.
The Pitt’s Shabana Azeez is a Poster, thank Goddess.
A white actor was cast in Maybe Happy Ending, and prominent AANHPI voices are speaking out.
Jonathan Goldstein reflects on the legacy and the future of “golden age” podcast Heavyweight.
Just another “emotionally intelligent, taco-loving wanderlust.”
Brilliantly chaotic, Emily, equal parts cultural dispatch and existential dread. The AI-dating bit had me chuckling and cringing in equal measure. “Curating your presence with grace”? Honestly, I miss the days when bios were just “I like dogs and hate coriander.” Now it’s all algorithmic charm and emotionally intelligent tacos.
Also, the notion that robots might be better at flirting than half the blokes I’ve met? Terrifying. But not entirely implausible.
As for Fashion Week and the “I’m too European for this” sentiment I felt that in my bones. Between the border paranoia and the performative patriotism, it’s starting to feel like couture meets dystopia.
Anyway, thanks for the ride. Your writing remains gloriously human typos, contradictions, and all.