That Instagram influencer might be AI.

From American Public Media, this is Marketplace Tech.

I'm Megan McCarty Carino.

We talk a lot about how the internet is filling up with AI content.

And of course, that includes the sort guaranteed to generate clicks and dollars, the adult variety.

Platforms like Instagram have seen an explosion in sexy AI influencers,

which sometimes steal content from real creators and mash them up with

AI. The practice is called AI pimping, according to Jason Kebler. He's a founder of 404 media who

collaborated with Wired on an investigation. There was this AI influencer named Emily Pellegrini.

And a few months ago, the person behind the Emily Pellegrini account pivoted that entire

account to be about how to make an AI influencer.

And so they sell a class.

He calls himself Professor Epp. But it's something like $250. And you have all these people talking about strategies for creating these

influencers, how to do it, how to monetize it. And there's, I mean, almost all of the AI influencers

that we saw are female personas.

And many of the people operating these accounts are men.

And we know that just because they told us that that's the case.

So it sounds like a whole kind of cottage industry has grown up to do this.

How do these AI pimps actually make money from this?

Yeah. Almost all of them have, they're not only fans, but they're only fans competitors.

And so there's a few different websites that more or less allow you to subscribe to a creator and pay them a monthly fee or to

buy imagery directly from them. And so essentially they're trying to build a really big

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