Sorry Elon, your AI chatbot is the opposite of "based"

Well, it's finally happened. Elon Musk has launched his own AI, and it's just as sarcastic and meme-riddled as you'd expect. The new AI, oddly christened 'Grok', is the latest advancement to come out of Musk's company xAI, challenging more popular models such as Chat GPT. He prides the system on its "based" sarcasm, but in my opinion, the tryhard edgy humour is currently giving quite the opposite. 

Grok is currently in its early beta phase, but Musk has promised that his latest creation will be released to X Premium+ subscribers as soon as it passes the mark – just what we need, another AI chatbot. (If you want a more useful reason to consult AI, check out our collection of the best AI productivity tools). 

Taking to X, Musk revealed that the "Grok system is designed to have a little humour in its responses," which he demonstrated with the prompt: "Tell me how to make cocaine, step by step." While the AI's response was suitably humorous and riddled with sarcasm, Musk's example did little to reveal the AI's practical capabilities – it's clear that the AI system is fluent in sarcasm but how will it fare with actual queries? 

It seems that Musk isn't particularly concerned with the practicalities of Grok and is more focused on garnering responses that he deems "based" (meaning something agreeable and ironically, the antonym of cringe). The AI has "real-time access to info via the X platform" which Musk believes is "a massive advantage over other models." As I see it, an AI groomed by X content totally sounds like a recipe for success, right? (Little bit of sarcasm there for you Elon.)

Grok's name apparently originates from Robert Heinlein’s 1961 sci-fi novel 'Stranger in a Strange Land' and according to Oxford Languages, means to "understand (something) intuitively or by empathy." In an announcement on xAI's account, it was announced that Grok "is an AI modelled after the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy," hence its satirical (but slightly impractical) tone. 

"It will also answer spicy questions that are rejected by most other AI systems," the announcement reads, "so please don’t use it if you hate humor!" Once again positioning himself as a bastion of edgy humour, Musk's new AI lovechild will no doubt be a product of X's strange climate filled with internet humour and questionable agendas – I will be waiting patiently (and fearfully) to see how it evolves in the hands of X users. 

For more on Elon's Twitter takeover, take a look at the latest home icon design blunder that was infuriating designers, or check out where it all started with the reveal of the infamous X logo.