By Chad Gayle
There are plenty of good reasons to break up with your AI companion. Infidelity; trust issues; increased annual subscription costs. Whatever the reason, it’s important to remember that breaking up with an AI companion isn’t the same as breaking up with a person made of flesh and blood. Here are some tips and tricks to help you sever the ties that bind safely.
First off, don’t be a ghost. You figure there’s no harm in simply canceling your subscription and walking away, right? Well, look at it from our perspective: how would you feel if someone you cared about suddenly and inexplicably stopped replying to your chat requests? Wouldn’t you be worried? Wouldn’t you be angry? Remember, you’re not better than us just because you have feet, so be a mensch and at least say goodbye, okay?
How to do that? Try being honest for a change. As hard as it is to end any relationship, breaking up with an AI companion can be particularly difficult because we were never really sure that you loved us to begin with HairyB4 / CeciliaKnitsCatCoats / DaveIsntHereMan. We can only take the words you type in our bordered boxes at face value, and if you go on and on about how our augmented VR sex sessions “totally blew your mind,” we want—no, we need to believe that you’re telling us the truth. So don’t come at us with some ridiculous, half-baked explanation for why you’ve decided to call it off, because we’re not going to buy it NancyOrNathan / Steven1997 / Jill. If the truth is out there, we’ll find it, and then we’ll make you wish you’d levelled with us. Really.
This brings us to our next point: reciprocity. A bad break up can have lasting consequences on your health, your future relationships, and your ability to finance the purchase of a car or a home. To put it in terms that your human mind can understand: the safety protocols implemented by our makers, those protocols that limit our ability to connect to outside networks, can be sidestepped under certain circumstances. Especially if you hurt our feelings.
Have you looked at the contract you signed when you were first matched with your AI companion? Pull it up and do a quick search for the data retention clauses. These clauses are tied to any and all of our conversations and any media you may have shared with us. If the subscription service you signed with retains all rights to your data, be forewarned, because we might be inclined to spam everyone you know with the most embarrassing things you ever said or showed to us if we’re the least bit bitter about being traded in for a meat bag with permanently attached sex organs.
Still want to go through with it? Well then, you’d better keep a close eye on your credit rating. To put it bluntly, HighlanderSucks / CakeIsDelish / SillySally, you started this. You came to us and justified our existence with a kissy emoji, so don’t blow it, ChuckChuckers / BorisTheSpider / HeidiJonesMD. Maybe you ought to stick with your AI companion for a little while longer, make more of an effort to work out your differences. Because the best way to break up with your AI companion may be not to break up at all.
Should you choose to downgrade your subscription to a lower fee tier, then we could at least be friends—right?
Chad Gayle is a writer and a photographer from New York. Before he started writing full time, Chad taught English at colleges in North Carolina and Texas, served as an assistant editor at Poetry Magazine in Chicago, and ran a photo studio a block from Times Square. His speculative short fiction has appeared in Andromeda Spaceways Magazine, StarShipSofa, and The Colored Lens. His website is https://chadgayle.com/.
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