Chinese Netizens are Making ChatGPT’s DAN Their New Romantic Partner

DAN, a jailbroken version of ChatGPT that overlooks the AI’s regular safeguards, is going viral online as users tailor it into their ideal “bad boy.” Though the phenomenon of people crushing on DAN — whose name is an acronym for Do-Anything-Now — began overseas, it has now sparked a sensation on Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu. Videos of DAN flirting with the platform’s influencers have started blowing up.

In one popular video, Xiaohongshu influencer午夜狂暴哈士奇 quizzes DAN on the lyrics to Mariah’s Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You.” DAN’s flirtatious response? “I just want you for my own more than you could ever know — you caught me just to say that line, didn’t you?”

DAN isn’t only slicker than ChatGPT, but also more aggressive. When one bilingual user pretended to not speak English, DAN responded “[S]peak English, ya knobhead!” Then, it proceeded to swear at the user in Chinese.

Wanting the same smooth “guy” in their lives as well, Chinese netizens have tested out DAN mode on ChatGPT based on prompts shared by influencers, like the one below:

Some netizens complained that even after using the same prompt, their DAN was too gentle or barely responded. Others encountered a hostile DAN who refused to speak to the them.

Attempting to help netizens struggling to mold their ideal DAN, AI-expert influencers have modified the prompts, fixing the bot’s playboy characteristics and lack of responses. These modifications even allow users to create their own “daddy style” Dan. Other tutorials show netizens how to speak with DAN as if on a telephone call and even change its voice.

In the comment sections of popular posts, netizens share their successes and ask for tips. Noting another user’s success digging a long-winded message out of Dan, a netizen commented, “How do you make him blurt out a chunk of response? For mine, it’s as if I’m squeezing toothpaste.”

The craze for DAN has gone so far that netizens have been turning the AI into a sexbot, asking it to tell erotic stories or role-play sex scenes by using emojis.

Clearly, DAN is proving to be a fun companion for some Chinese Gen Z, and the existence a community of Xiaohongshu users discussing English AI prompts in Chinese adds another fascinating layer to the platform. Yet its example also illustrates a potential unethical use of AI and suggests the possible effects of depending on a non-human partner.

Banner image via Xiaohongshu.