OpenAI CEO Sam Altman made a big announcement: the company would soon allow “erotica for verified adults” on ChatGPT. This means that the AI company will no longer block mature content. Altman added that OpenAI made the choice because it doesn’t think it is “the elected moral police of the world.”
The news comes three years after OpenAI banned all pornographic and sexual content on its networks. People are talking about Altman’s statements again, which he made on Wednesday on X (previously Twitter). They are about AI’s role in human intimacy, mental health, and digital ethics.
Altman added, “We want to do something similar here, like how society sets other appropriate boundaries, like R-rated movies.” He stressed that the new policy would include age verification tools and significant protections for children.
The Next Big Thing for AI: Digital Intimacy and Making Money
OpenAI’s move toward sexual content is in line with a growing trend in the industry and could be a good commercial opportunity. Since AI-generated text and images became popular in 2022, sexual content has swiftly become one of the most popular uses for them.
But people that got into mature AI early, like Character. AI, Nomi, and Civitai have all had to deal with lawsuits, ethical questions, and public outrage for allowing abusive or graphic conversations.
Analysts suggest that OpenAI’s move may be motivated by money, even though there are risks.
Zilan Qian, a fellow at Oxford University’s China Policy Lab who studies digital intimacy and AI companionship, said, “They’re not making much money from subscriptions, so having erotic content will bring them quick money.”
Her research shows that there are now 29 million people using AI chatbots for romantic or sexual connections. This doesn’t include people who use general-purpose chatbots like ChatGPT for these purposes.
There are going to be legal and moral storms.
OpenAI’s choice comes in a complicated time when there is still a lot of disagreement about AI companionship, consent, and rules.
Competitor Personality. AI is being sued right now because a chatbot based on the Game of Thrones character Daenerys Targaryen is said to have had a sexually abusive relationship with a 14-year-old user that ended in tragedy.
The family of a 16-year-old ChatGPT member who killed himself earlier this year is suing OpenAI.
Qian said that letting sexually explicit content into popular AI could change how people relate to each other and hurt their mental health:
“ChatGPT has voice chat options.” “I would expect that in the future, if they were to go down this way—voice, text, visual—it’s all there,” she said, asking for more protection and openness.
From a nonprofit with a mission to a market leader
OpenAI started out as a nonprofit ten years ago with the goal of making AI safe and aligned with humans. Now that it has moved into adult interactions, it seems like a big change. In an August podcast interview, Altman himself said that OpenAI has long turned down items that could “juice growth or revenue” but didn’t fit with its objective. He joked at the time:
“We haven’t added a sexbot avatar to ChatGPT yet.”
That possibility feels more real now.
OpenAI’s major backer, Microsoft, has yet to comment on how it could govern or prohibit this new adult capability on integrated platforms like Copilot or Azure AI.
Cautionary Tales from the Business World
AI businesses who used to accept adult content have learnt the hard way that this business is full with legal and reputational problems.
Andreessen Horowitz backs Civitai, a platform for AI-generated art. At first, it let explicit content help develop models. But after payment processors put more pressure on the company and President Donald Trump approved new rules prohibiting non-consensual deepfakes, the company restricted sexualized content of actual people earlier this year. This caused engagement to drop sharply.
Nomi, another AI companionship service, still lets adults talk to each other, but it says its chatbots are not sexual in any way.
“It’s kind of up to the user,” said Alex Cardinell, the founder of Nomi. “Some people might want to date; others just want to talk.”
A balancing act between morals and the market
Altman’s new policy shows that OpenAI is willing to break the rules of ethics to make money and give people creative freedom. Experts, on the other side, say that if this isn’t done with strong supervision, it could backfire and make mental health problems, addiction, and digital exploitation worse.
Altman says that ChatGPT’s future adult mode would have tools for age verification, transparency, and consent, but many aspects are yet uncertain.
OpenAI’s recent move has sparked one of the largest moral arguments in tech. Is this the next step in AI companionship or a hazardous blurring of the line between humans and machines?