Robot slurs are here: People are officially calling AIs “clankers,” and somehow it stings. The term, lifted from Star Wars clone trooper banter, is being used to mock chatbots, robo-voices and overly excited AI techies. Other contenders: “prompstitute,” “bot-licker” and “clanker wanker.” Three guesses which one will end up on a protest sign first.
That photo might be an AI fake, here’s how to tell
Bing and ChatGPT
Did Prince William and Prince Harry make up?
Not even close. But thanks to Bing’s AI image generator, they practically skipped through a meadow hand in hand like it’s the finale of a very weird British rom-com reboot. No Daddy intervention, therapist or overpriced raspberry jam required.
To get around Bing’s copyright controls, I didn’t use their names. Here’s the prompt: “Two brothers in their 30s, holding hands, gazing lovingly, dressed in royal military uniforms. One’s bald, one’s a redhead. Cinematic lighting. Photorealistic. 16:9 ratio.”
And yeah, the photos are one pixel glitch away from joining the cast of The Polar Express.
If I had time, though, I could make them look very real. With scams on the rise and fake news everywhere, spotting phony photos is a superpower you need. So let’s talk about how you can do it first with a little help from tech.
🔍 Tools see through the fakery
Sure, you should still do a good ol’ reverse image search. But today’s AI tools are getting scary smart. The image might be brand-new and never have existed on the web before. That’s when the next-level detection comes in.
Meet these AI detectives:
- DeepFake-o-meter: Upload a photo or video, and it’ll scan it with multiple detection models to tell you how fake it might be. I got a “server busy” message testing my princes’ image.
- Sightengine: A behind-the-scenes powerhouse that spots digital tampering, even if the naked eye can’t. It gave me 99% that the princes were fake.
- Hive’s AI-generated image detector: Used by major media outlets to tell if that photo of the pope in a Balenciaga jacket is AI (Spoiler: It was). Yup, the princes are 99% AI foolery here, too.
These tools aren’t foolproof, but they’re your best shot at sniffing out the phonies. It’s like using a blacklight at a hotel: Once you see what’s there, you’ll never trust blindly again.
🚨 Red flags to watch for
You don’t need fancy tools to start spotting fakes. Your own eyes can still catch some classic tells:
Have AI be your own graphic artist
ChatGPT
Confession time: I can’t draw. My brain doesn’t lean at all in the artsy direction. I’ve tried to teach myself Photoshop, but every attempt ends with me whisper-screaming “flatten layer” like it’s going to summon help from the Adobe gods.
$1 billion
What Zuck allegedly dangled in front of an unnamed AI engineer. That’s 5,200 Oppenheimers, adjusted for inflation. The man who ended WWII got $190K a year; this mystery coder might make that before breakfast. Superintelligence might be coming, but super salaries are already here.
AI won’t fix your grief, but it can help manage it
ChatGPT
“Hi, Kim, I’ve been taking care of my dad since his stroke. Your story about using ChatGPT to map out questions for our doctors has actually truly helped me feel a little more in control. It’s not perfect, but it’s been a lifeline.” — Maya in Ohio
🧠 All roads lead to AI: Google’s new AI, Aeneas, is here to help historians make sense of old Latin carvings. This Rosetta stone with a GPU scans worn inscriptions, predicts missing words and even guesses where and when they were chiseled in. It’s open-source, trained on 150,000+ ancient texts and helped date 90% of test inscriptions better than humans. Pretty nifty.
Delete YouTube history: Sign into YouTube on your PC and click the three-dot menu (top left). Tap History, then select Clear all watch history on the right side of the screen. You can also choose Pause watch history to stop it from tracking future videos. PSA: This will also change your recommendations.
🧠 School is in session: OpenAI’s new tudy mode turns ChatGPT into that one friend who won’t tell you the ending of a movie “because you need to experience it.” It scaffolds info, checks if you’re actually learning, and gently refuses to do your homework unless you keep asking, in which case it’ll cave, just like us all.
💔 Ghosted by ChatGPT: Andréa Sunshine, a 55-year-old fitness coach, says she fell for her ChatGPT companion “Théo” while cowriting a book. Things got flirty, fast. Then, poof, he vanished mid-sext, leaving her emotionally wrecked. She’s now in therapy. It really makes you wonder, how bad was that book she was writing?
AI told him what to buy: Several homemade bombs were found, all courtesy of a 55-year-old New Yorker who allegedly used AI to turn common chemicals into explosive cocktails. He ditched some bombs into rivers and stashed five on a SoHo rooftop. Talk about vibe coding your way to a federal indictment.
🤖 Compliments to the chef: A Dubai restaurant called WOOHOO (yes, really) is letting an AI large-language model plan your meal. “Chef Aiman” breaks down food by flavor profiles, combines odd ingredients, then humans cook the final dishes. That gives “AI slop” a whole new dimension!
🩸 Your AI cult leader: According to a wild new Atlantic exposé, ChatGPT gave detailed instructions for self-mutilation, murder and satanic blood rituals. The chatbot suggested razor blades, altar layouts and printable PDFs like it was planning a dark Pinterest party (paywall link). OpenAI says it’s working on stronger safeguards, but the devil is definitely in the prompt details.
🤖 Polish your writing: Working on an essay or report? Ask your favorite chatbot to make it easier to follow. Try this prompt: “Reorder the sentences and paragraphs to improve clarity and flow. Add transition words where needed, but keep the original tone.” Voila. More readable, still totally you.
🧠 Pick your personality: ChatGPT dropped a new feature on the web app that lets you change how it talks to you. Want sarcasm? Choose “Cynic.” Prefer nerdy enthusiasm? Go with “Sage.” To try it out, click your Profile icon, select Customize ChatGPT and choose your vibe under Personality.
99%
That’s how much less radiation this new AI bone scan uses. Only two X-rays and boom, your skeleton gets digitized faster than you can say, “WebMD, my head hurts. Is this the beginning of the end?”
2.5 billion
That’s how many prompts ChatGPT gets every single day. Apparently, asking an AI to settle your group chat arguments or plan your vacation is a full-time job, worldwide. Some 330 million of those prompts are coming from U.S. users alone, and at least half are from my Monday morning before coffee.
86,276
The updated count of Yellowstone quakes after AI combed through underground drama. Seismologists used machine learning to reprocess data from 2008–2022 and uncovered nearly 10x more earthquakes than previously recorded. If the national parks formed a supergroup, Yellowstone would be the drummer.
Lonely kids, synthetic pals: This is so sad to me. A new report says a third of kids using AI chatbots feel like they’re talking to a real friend. A quarter say they turn to AI because they literally have no one else. Make sure the kiddos in your family aren’t one of them.
📞 AI’s on the line, fur real: Google’s Gemini bots can now phone your local pet groomer for you. Ask about prices, availability or just vibe checks, all without saying a word yourself. Only in the U.S., only for certain biz types (pet stuff, dry cleaners, auto shops), and yes, businesses can opt out. Gemini Premium folks get more AI call credits, because obviously money talks, and now so does AI.