Aspiring influencers on TikTok are strategically employing artificial intelligence (AI) to rapidly amass an audience. Some are even resorting to AI-backed ‘live audience’ apps to artificially boost their online popularity and attract real human followers.
One such app is Parallel Live, advertised as the “#1 Fame Simulator” on the iOS App Store and Google Play Store. It recreates the layout of a TikTok or Instagram livestream in the app, including buttons, likes, and comments sections. Users merely have to press record and begin speaking, and the AI-generated simulated viewership, likes, and comments start rolling in.
Many content creators are using this app in public, showing their fake livestreams to random people to generate genuine reactions of awe and surprise. One content creator, under the handle ItsPoloKidd, has been seen flaunting Parallel Live to his followers and using it to attract women on the street by showing them the falsified livestreams.
Ethan Keiser, the founder of the app, has also been found promoting Parallel Live by approaching random women on the street with a camera. Another TikTok creator, Austyn Crispell, advertised Parallel Live as a side hustle idea and one of several “unethical ways to make money”. He suggested users pretend to be famous rappers and approach shop owners with the app’s fake livestream open to impress them, leading to financial rewards. He claim his followers are making up to US$68,000 weekly by employing this method.
Parallel Live also maintains a Discord channel for user support. As of writing, the channel has roughly 160 members. Parallel Live can be downloaded for free on the iOS App Store. It offers a free three-day trial after which users must subscribe for US$9.99 per week. Other enhanced subscription packages including a US$49.99 per month “Premium” and a US$99.99 per year “Experience Fame!” are also available.
After creating an account, users can customise various settings like activating “Hater Mode” and turning on “AI Gifting”, where an AI-generated simulated audience showers the user with (fake!) gifts.
While the developer, Big Brains LLC, intended Parallel Live to be used for pranking friends, users have creatively found ways to use it as a potential money-making tool.
