AI could sabotage Valentine’s Day plans – and suck the romance out of the occasion, a dating expert has warned.
Online dating guru Mark Brooks says AI tools like ChatGPT can help shy singles boost their confidence, but warns that taking it too far is a form of “catfishing”.
The 52-year-old says millions of users are now using artificial intelligence to write profiles, craft messages and even decide what to say on a date.
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Mark says AI risks making users lazier about real-life dating, with many meet-ups ending early when dates fail to live up to expectations.
“People will sometimes use it to improve their profiles but my concern is that they take it too far,” Mark, from Grimsby, Lincs, told Need To Know.
“It’s OK to be imperfect because if someone rocks up to a date and it’s like they can’t recognise you visually or character-wise, it’s a waste of time for everybody.
“It’s catfishing, really.
“The key question is, do people lie in dating apps or do they fib?
“The reality is they fib a lot and the reason they fib is because they want to enhance themselves and give themselves an edge so they get the date – but there’s a fine line.
“A fib is me saying, I’m actually 5ft 10in but when I put my cowboy boots on, I’m 6ft.
“It’s very important to use AI in a manner closer to [the real you].
“If you suck at spelling, you probably shouldn’t correct all of your spelling.
“Use it to be the authentic you, to save a bit of time, but don’t use it to misrepresent because that’s bad for everybody.
“Otherwise, they’re letting themselves down.
“It’s a bad idea to start a relationship with a set of lies.”
But he says AI has its advantages, as it can help boost the confidence of daters who “don’t have much game”.
Mark, who has worked with major dating brands including eHarmony and Plenty of Fish, said: “There are some people who’ve got a lot of game and they get a lot of attention on dating apps.
“But most people don’t have that much game.
“It’s tough to be truly appealing online because we lose a dimension.
“It could help someone who’s really shy. It just makes them feel a little bit more confident and to get their game on.
“People use ChatGPT for advice on what to do after the date.
“I think that’s amazing. That’s the best way to use AI right now.”
The dad-of-three says his main concern is that using AI to date could kill the romance, especially around Valentine’s Day.
He said: “AI could weaken real life social skills and dating skills and I’m quite concerned about that.
“I see the pattern with my youngsters.
“Just in social media in general, we’re moving into computer-mediated communication, which changes the way we think.
“It changes our psyche and psychology. There’s no two ways about it.
“We need to encourage people to be more real and get outside.”
Mark met his wife Irena, 47, on holiday in Prague in 2005 and they married in 2009.
Despite his qualms about daters using new intelligent tools, he admits AI has long been a key part of dating app software, helping to police the apps as well as facilitate matches.
Mark added: “We’ve actually used AI for many years in the industry.
“Now we have AI, we can actually get to know people more deeply.
“We can help them find the one in a more sophisticated way.
“One aspect is trust and safety.
“When someone comes onto a dating app, they expect an experience which is better than the real world in some way.
“The problem in the dating industry that we have to police is that people can behave quite strangely on apps.
“We have to guard our members against scammers, spammers, the obscene and the obnoxious.
“The first line of defence is AI.
“We look at words patterns of communication, patterns of behaviour, and we model those using AI.
“And if we see those behaviours, we can quarantine.
“Going back 15 years, we’ve used some form of AI, pattern recognition.”
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