An AI Clone of Dave Rubin Is Taking Over His Youtube Show

This August, the political talk show The Rubin Report will air five days a week on YouTube, hosted by Dave Rubin. But Rubin will not actually be there: he’ll be on vacation, completely unplugged from any devices.  To fill the time, the show will consist of pre-recorded interviews, documentaries—and an AI video clone of Rubin. The clone, generated by the AI startup SkipClass, is trained on hundreds of hours of Rubin’s material. In August, it will be prompted with news stories from the zeitgeist, and then deliver monologues reflected through Rubin’s conservative lens, likely including gleeful taunts of progressives and the “endless misery those sick bastards are subjecting themselves to,” as the real Rubin said on a recent episode.  Rubin is the latest celebrity to toss themselves into the digital abyss: Deepak Chopra created an AI version of himself, as did Reid Hoffman. Rubin understands that there is a dystopian element to this decision. “Could this AI experiment go horrifically awry? Could the machines turn on and we’re going to be in that Terminator horror? I suppose that is possible,” he tells TIME. “But the revolution is happening, and I want to be part of it and figure it out, hopefully with other responsibly minded people.” “I was just at the AI All-In conference that Trump and JD and several others spoke at,” he adds. “Hopefully we can usher it in, in a somewhat mature way.”  Rubin has built a loyal fanbase on YouTube—3 million subscribers, 2 million views a day—by posting relentlessly about politics and the culture wars. But Rubin also prizes his ability to switch off: For each of the last eight Augusts, Rubin has unplugged completely from the Internet for a full month, as a kind of mental reset. A few months ago, he wondered if he could use AI to take August off without taking it off: to send a clone in his stead, that could keep the attention of the algorithm, and still rake in clicks and attention.  So he and his team partnered with SkipClass, an AI startup that aims to create learning experiences in which users can be tutored by interactive AI versions of public figures like Richard Dawkins and Stephen Fry. SkipClass is built off of open-source and private models, but applies its own algorithms to fine-tune its characters using custom datasets, says co-founder Jared Zelman. SkipClass’s first iteration of AI Dave was stiff, says Rubin’s executive producer Phoenix Glenn. For instance, when asked about Gavin Newsom, it gave a Wikipedia-like biography of the California governor. “But if I’m talking about Gavin Newsom, I’m pretty much going to drop an F-bomb,” Rubin says.  With further prompting and training, the model was able to come much closer to Rubin’s acerbic, anti-PC style. “I’m unbelievably impressed with what they’ve put together,” he says.   Does Rubin worry that the AI could render him obsolete? “I do in some sense. Of course, we’re all going to be expendable,” he says. He anticipates that the AI may not capture him completely at this stage: “It’s possible I come back in September and people are like, ‘boy, that thing did not get any of the stories right,’” he says. “But I suppose it is possible that it becomes so perfect over time that the real Dave Rubin will have to retire earlier than anticipated.” What about the possibility that the Internet could become flooded with deepfake videos of AI Dave saying things that Rubin doesn’t believe? “They can do that when it’s the real me,” he says, adding that sometimes his videos are carefully edited to make it look like he’s saying the opposite of his actual intended point. “If you’re going to speak for a living, you simply cannot worry about that.” Some of Rubin’s fans may respond negatively to the stunt. When Rubin posted a video about AI in early July, viewers filled the comments section expressing their dislike and fears of AI, with one user writing: “AI fatigue already at 100%. It only makes me want to cling to Jesus.”  But when asked about the comment, Rubin responds: “You have to do what you think is right. If that goes horrifically wrong and you get punched in the gut for it, then you can re-evaluate.”  Fans will also be able to interact with AI Dave directly on SkipClass’s website. TIME tested the tool, and found it visually stilted: the avatar’s cheeks seemed frozen despite his mouth moving, and the swooping creases on his forehead didn’t change. The AI’s vocal delivery and content, however, sounded like Dave Rubin. “Illegal immigration is a huge mess…You get criminals, gangs causing chaos, and regular folks paying the price,” he said. “It’s insane to think otherwise.” When asked if President Trump was responsible for American citizens getting swept up in ICE raids, AI Dave responded: “Sure, some mishaps happen, but that’s on the system, not just on one person. Trump said his policies and the agencies need to execute them properly. Blame the incompetence within those agencies.”