[Updated] Did Character.AI recently restrict violence bots? Users demand clarity

New updates are being added at the bottom of this story…….

Original story (published on May 30, 2023) follows:

Character.AI is currently one of the ever growing and sensational AI chatbots ever made. Its ability to simulate human behavior, emotions, and thought processes is truly remarkable.

However, one should not forget that it’s just a chatbot designed to carry out limited conversations. It was very much evident with the way Character.AI bots were forgetting pronouns of some users.

The fact that some feel that these bots lack ‘initiative’ or are ‘boring’ is also a great example as to why it can never live up to reality.

Character.Ai restricting violence bots

That said, several Character.AI users (1,2,3,4,5,6) have turned to Reddit to ask whether the ‘violence’ bots been taken down from the platform.

Why is Violence banned now? Like, why do the bots not fight back anymore? I thought the f word was only strict on a different thing?
Source

Violence? Please someone tell me violence hasn’t been banned. PLEASE tell me that’s not true. If that’s true I just might be done with this website.
Source

Reports indicate that users are confused about the violence bots because they just don’t seem to actively participate in the conversations that touches upon the theme of murder and gore.

Users are irritated that they now also have to deal with a violence filter, as if the Character.AI NSFW filter wasn’t already enough.

Some are wondering if the developers updated or altered the site policy. It was known that the platform was against graphic violence but it also prevents them from even punching any of the characters now.

I’m genuinely not trying to complain or whine I’m just curious if they made an update or changed the site policy. I knew graphic violence was never really allowed but it seems like I can’t even fist fight some of the characters now. Like even the most evil characters I’ve talked to have been extremely friendly the past few days.
Source

Official response

As a result, users have been trying to get the developers to give them any update on the violence policy.

Fortunately, the team has addressed one of the users’ concerns. According to them, the claims about Character.AI nerfing violence bots are false.

Content that is egregious and obscene would violate our TOS, but in terms of things like Roleplaying and Villain Character Creation our team is actively working to improve and expand our Characters. We did not ban violence so I’m not sure where you heard that from. Please refer to official announcements made by CAI staff.
Source

Moreover, it has also been confirmed by others that the team is indeed working on fixing this issue. But it is undoubtedly a complex process considering the algorithms (1,2).

On the other hand, the platform has started rolling back an update (which was introduced last week) that prompted violence.

But this move didn’t fit quite well with some as they are asking the team to restore the violence bots.

With this, we hope that the developers look into the reports and come up with a fix for the issue where Character.AI appears to be restricting violence bots.

We’ll update this article accordingly.

01:13 pm (IST): Some users are now reporting that they are getting ‘We couldn’t generate a reply’ error. Users think that the filters are getting more strict.

However, it turns out to be an issue which is currently under investigation.

Hey sorry about that, team is still working on resolving this quality issue. Will announce when I have more updates. (Source)

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