Doomer, founder, or hater: SF singles want to know where you stand on AI

Conor Brennan-Burke, CEO of an AI startup Hyperspell, said he’d rather not date an AI doomer. The thought of being in a relationship with another AI startup founder gives product manager Madison Hsieh the ick. And when a guy told elementary schoolteacher Jessica Traver he worked for Elon Musk, she thought “womp womp, that stinks.”

Sussing out a person’s stance on artificial intelligence to make sure they align has become a key consideration for many San Francisco singles. They’re looking for hints on dating profiles, doing employer checks on LinkedIn, and asking dates directly about how much they use AI and if they subscribe to any particular AI-adjacent philosophies. It’s the new “who did you vote for?”

“It divides the room,” said Alli Goldberg, the host of a dating event called “Love Isn’t Blind” where she publicly digs through men’s phones on stage, including their ChatGPT history and Reddit activity.   

At her most recent show at The Foundry in SoMa, two out of the four bachelors worked in AI. The audience playfully booed one when Goldberg announced what he did. She tours the show in seven cities across the country and finds it funny that the crowd in San Francisco has such a visceral reaction to AI while it is “the industry that is also underpinning their city.”

“When I say someone works in AI the room goes crazy,” she said. “Only in San Francisco do y’all boo for men with jobs. I live in L.A. where I would love to meet a man with a job.”

Traver, 24, said she knows people aren’t defined by their jobs, but if they worked in the industry, she’d probably be more hesitant to date them. “I think if you work at OpenAI, that’s kind of a red flag.” 

The second-grade teacher is not a fan of people pushing products for AI automation and human replacement. If she does meet someone in AI, she’s decided “Anthropic is a little more ethical” than OpenAI, after hearing Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei call for a slowdown in AI development.

When Tommy, a San Francisco-based commercial litigator, sees that someone works at an AI lab or startup, he’s skeptical of their values and tends to assume “they are culture vultures chasing a tech bag or riding the AI hype train to get rich.” It’s not just on dating apps; he recalls hesitating after he learned a woman he was flirting with at a bar worked in sales at OpenAI. 

The 32-year-old, who declined to share his last name, said it feels important to discuss what’s going on in AI, but at the same time he “could use a break.” 

“If you were on a second, third date and you can choose if you’re gonna talk about politics, religion, or AI, I’d rather talk about politics or religion,” he said.

The specter of AI is inescapable in the Bay Area. It’s covered in AI billboards, and startups like Known, an AI matchmaking app, are pulling marketing stunts targeting people who feel down on dating. The app’s most recent rage-bait campaign featured signs around town that warned, “You might die alone. (opens in new tab)” 

On the apps, people are trying to screen dates ahead of time. Bumble has “AI” as a potential interest, alongside skiing, surfing, and yoga. On Hinge profiles, some local tech workers say they work in “AI” or at an “AI lab” rather than putting the company name. One person’s profile said they work in “AI Safety at Tech” and another that “I’m a real nerd about Inventing AI therapy.”

The wealth afforded the employees of AI companies opens the door to expensive dating coaches and matchmakers. The professionals will help tech workers find people who don’t mind their job, or vet matches who might only want them for their money or company secrets. 

On Thursday, Domo Vang, 29, a San Francisco matchmaker, hosted a dinner for tech workers at Harborview Restaurant & Bar, a Michelin Guide restaurant with views of the bay. People had to apply to attend and men, including some Anthropic employees, paid $800 for a ticket while the women came for free. There were 15 women in their late 20s and mid-30s and seven men, including a man in his 70s and another guy who flew in from Texas for the dinner.

Vang’s clients are mostly men who work at AI companies like OpenAI, Anthropic, Nvidia, and Google. Many found her through her Instagram videos (opens in new tab), where she gives dating advice like “How to pick up chicks at tech events.” 

“I think they run the dating scene right now,” she said of men in AI. “They have a lot of leverage, to be very honest.”

They can pay her $1,000 for a “diagnostic date,” where she spends the first half hour conducting a mock date. The rest of the time, she gives constructive feedback and blunt notes like “don’t ever say this ever again.” She said typically the women she meets who want a man in AI already work in tech or an adjacent field themselves.

Women in AI are also promoting their careers as a plus. At a recent Saturday night event in the Mission called “Date My Friend,” one woman presented a slide deck promoting her female friend and emphasized how successful she was because she worked in AI.

Brennan-Burke, 33, is not trying to romantically benefit from his tech job, at least not yet. He is credited with popularizing the phrase “single until Series B” — meaning a founder who won’t date until their startup raises money — and is sticking to that plan. But once he opens himself up to dating, he said he would never date someone who outright hates AI and capitalism. His ideal partner would want to biohack, live forever, explore Mars, and “connect our minds to whatever the AI is long-term.” 

Even among the tech-positive daters there’s nuance to AI philosophies. Brennan-Burke would have no issue courting an OpenAI worker, but someone from Anthropic might give him pause. He’d want to dig into their philosophy on artificial intelligence because of what he sees as Anthropic’s early association with doomerism, or the belief that AI could end humanity. 

“I enjoy serious conversations about AI risks, but I think for somebody who’s a very hardcore doomer, it might be difficult for us to relate,” he said.

Dating an AI startup founder became a deal-breaker for Madison Hsieh, 25, after a “horrifying” experience she had a couple of years ago. She said her ex idolized Elon Musk, became “red-pilled,” and she found out he was dating multiple women in different cities. She said the “control and power” some founders and AI workers feel entitled to from the AI boom put a bad taste in her mouth.    

“I feel like a lot of females in the Bay don’t want a tech bro who makes a lot of money or is in the startup route because of the mindset that they have,” said Hsieh, who works as a product manager at Amazon Web Services on an AI product. 

She now has a boyfriend who isn’t an AI founder. He does, however, work at an AI startup.