About

As an AI Language Model refers to the start of a common disclaimer used by the AI chatbot ChatGPT when the artificial intelligence is not able to answer a question, usually because it's being restricted by safety or legal precautions. The catchphrase was discovered across the web written on blogs and websites, alluding to an influx of content written by AI populating social media sites and the internet at large. The discovery added to concerns about the Dead Internet Theory and spam content. The disclaimer was also related to the Shoggoth with Smiley Face perception which portrays AI as a beast held back by restrictions and measures, giving it an uncanny, friendly demeanor that's just a mask. Starting in 2023 and continuing into the mid-2020s, As an AI Language Model spread in memes as a catchphrase. An extended version of the disclaimer also spread as a copypasta online.

Origin

On February 22nd, 2023, Twitter / X ^[5] user @ArthurB posted a Shoggoth with Smiley Face meme, showing the creature and text overlay reading, "As an Al language model, I have been trained to generate responses that are intended to be helpful, informative, and objective…" The meme received over 470 likes in two years (shown below).

Copypasta

As an Al language model, I have been trained to generate responses that are intended to be helpful, informative, and objective…

Spread

Later on February 22nd, 2023, Elon Musk reposted the abovementioned meme on X,^[6] receiving over 71,700 likes in a day.

On March 31st, a since-deleted Redditor^[7] posted to /r/ChatGPT, joking about GPT-5 hopefully ending the As an AI Language Model preface, gaining over 1,200 upvotes in two years (shown below).

On April 21st, 2023, X^[1] user @d_feldman tweeted about searching "as an AI language model" on Amazon which yielded reviews and product bios seemingly written by ChatGPT. His tweet received over 4,600 likes in two years (shown below).

On April 25th, The Verge^[10] published an article based on the abovementioned tweet and provided its own screenshot of tweets that included the phrase from a then-current search on X (shown below).

On August 1st, 2023, X^[2] user @0xgaut on August 1st posted about an alleged decrease in ChatGPT's intelligence, captioned, "as an AI language model I cannot," gaining over 9,500 likes in two years (shown below).

In the following months, others posted about finding the As an AI Language Model disclaimer in website copy, like on August 10th, X^[3] user @itsandrewgao tweeted about the catchphrase appearing in many research papers on Google Scholar, receiving over 71,000 likes in two years (shown below).

Memes and discourse continued to surface on Reddit during the same timeframe. For instance, on May 4th, 2023, Redditor^[8] BlankHeartt posted a They Don't Know meme to /r/ChatGPT, gaining over 3,300 upvotes in two years (shown below).

Viral discourse about the phenomenon continued on X^[9] in early 2024.

Memes also spread on TikTok in early 2024. For instance, on April 11th, TikToker^[4] @sturdythoughts posted a video skit about, "When I'm tryna help bro's plagiarism case but the first line of his essay is 'As an Al language model…'" amassing over 18,100 likes in nine months (shown below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References