They Called Her Terminator: AI Beauty from Yekaterinburg Takes Social Media by Storm
Lana Mayer appeared on social media in early January and has already become a blogger with 100,000 subscribers.
Models with unusual appearances are captivating social media. They share touching stories about self-acceptance with their followers. The girls divulge deeply personal memories: how they were humiliated at school and how guys broke up with them because of their looks, but despite the problems, they are not afraid to speak out and start blogs. Readers support the influencers in the comments, saying they will overcome all difficulties. However, in reality, these models do not exist. They are characters generated by neural networks, created to tell heart-wrenching stories to a gullible audience.
The model«s best friend is her husky Makvin.
One popular account is Lana, a 25-year-old AI model from Yekaterinburg. Her profile was created on January 4, and it now has over 100,000 subscribers. Videos about the difficult fate of the beauty with a facial burn garner millions of views. And many don«t even realize the character is fictional, despite the profile stating »ai model«.
Lana regularly appears at famous locations in Yekaterinburg.
Lana«s story is truly inspiring. The girl says she is from Nyagan (Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug). Her childhood was happy until something terrible happened.
The character Lana has a touching backstory that resonates with many followers.
«In 2006, I had an accident, which I still find difficult to talk about. In 2007, I started school, and they started calling me Terminator. That»s when I began to develop big complexes. At age 11, I really closed myself off, wore a mask, and cut my bangs so people wouldn«t see my scars,» shares the blogger.
Many supporters praise Lana«s beauty and share encouraging comments.
Lana«s only friend in her youth was a husky named Makvin. After finishing school, the girl moved to Yekaterinburg and faced severe depression. But now she has decided to run a blog and receives a lot of support, and her story motivates her subscribers.
The AI model Zlata has vitiligo, another example of unique appearance.
Lana«s creators are artists from AI-studio MAKVIN, Makar Vinokurov and Lina Shaibakova. Lina literally started learning to create videos using neural networks just a couple of months ago. The idea to create a separate account with an AI model came to the artists as soon as the trend emerged.
Eva is another popular AI-generated model gaining traction online.
«One night, Makar came up with two models (Lana and Eva) and created the first »snaps« (natural photos of the model. — Ed.) for them to create content and develop stories. We were in a big hurry and wanted to launch as soon as possible, so Lana»s personality was created on the fly. We didn«t have a pre-written character or a detailed script. Initially, we only knew one key detail: Lana has a burn that appeared in childhood due to some tragic situation. At the same time, we still haven»t revealed exactly how the scar appeared — it«s important for us to maintain the intrigue,» explained Lina Shaibakova.
This AI model discusses learning to live with a facial scar.
It«s hard not to notice the external resemblance between the model and her creator. Similar names (Lina and Lana), both are from Yekaterinburg, and an Asian appearance type.
AI models participate in trends like showing one«s parents on social media.
«We chose Yekaterinburg for a reason: I»m from Yekaterinburg, it«s easier for me to build scenes and environments, I can make the content more realistic. Also, I have a dog too, but a different breed. As for appearance — we noticed that among AI models, there aren»t that many girls with an Eastern, Asian look. I myself am roughly that type, and it was interesting to choose this image.
One of my childhood photos served as the idea for creating Lana«s childhood photo, which other AI bloggers are now copying. I think we will continue to use such a life hack, but my personal photos (as an adult) and videos were not used as a basis. We worked through prompts, references, visual selections (including from Pinterest), meaning the image was created almost independently of me,» the artist explained.
Developing the project took four days — they started working after the New Year and launched the account on January 4. The artists say they work practically around the clock, with breaks for sleep, to promote the account. The authors not only come up with ideas for videos themselves but also analyze competitors. So far, the model hasn«t brought profit, but many advertising offers are coming in.
«Some people create a model and profit from the first audience, going the way of fraud or selling cheap advertising on the back of hype; we chose a different strategy. Many advertising offers come in, but they don»t fit the blog«s concept. Our task is to make Lana the largest AI blogger and influencer, possibly launch our own product and make her an ambassador, or collaborate with major brands, other bloggers, or even stars. Lana can convey many interesting and positive things through the prism of our beliefs,» Lina added.
So far, Lana has no haters — according to her creators, 95% of comments under posts are positive.
«Many major bloggers leave comments in support of Lana, fan services appear, people who are ready to marry her and write about it daily, but there are also those 5% of people who write hate, claiming we are deceiving people. However, every publication has a note that the content is created with the help of neural networks. The profile itself indicates that this is an AI blogger. We never hid from the start that this is not a real person, we don»t deny it. So what exactly is the deception?« the artist responded to the negativity.
The artists confirmed that there is huge competition among neuro-models. The trend appeared literally at the end of December, and in the authors« opinion, it has great potential. But only those who have worked out the entire concept and put effort into the project will »survive«.
Can a Non-Existent Model Earn Real Money?
AI creative designer from Yekaterinburg Alexander Tsarapkin explained that such models usually have two paths: the first is advertising for brands, collaborations (what influencers typically earn from). The second is running various platforms with donations, where social media merely provides reach and directs traffic to the desired platform. Donations are usually given for more personalized and unique content.
«Profit from the first and second method will depend on the marketing component: how you promote your model and how unusual, unique (and realistic, of course) it will be. In the first case, prices for advertising and collaborations are comparable or 20–50% lower than those real influencers work with. The price for a post in an account with 50–100 thousand subscribers ranges from $300 to $500 per post. For large accounts (500 thousand — a million subscribers), the cost can reach $100,000.
In the second option, the earning logic is the same as for live models. Demand and price are limited only by audience psychology. But on average, the price is also 20–50% lower than for real accounts. A small profile, which most are, can earn from $100 to $1,000 per month provided there is regular posting and active communication. Medium accounts (1,000–2,000 paying subscribers) can potentially earn up to $80,000. There is also monetization of content from the social networks themselves, but that«s a much smaller share of revenue,» explained the designer.
At the same time, simply coming up with an AI character is not enough. You need to replicate its appearance in every generation, and according to the designer, this is a complex process, especially when it comes to high-quality models that are hard to distinguish from real people. To create them, you need to train the neural network to replicate the appearance from generation to generation.
Alexander added that the popularity of such accounts comes from several factors. Besides quality, the uniqueness of appearance is important. For example, pigmented models, with mixed skin color or unusual scars and defects, are currently popular. The model«s story and the ability to tell it also play a role.
Furthermore, according to the designer, it is the older audience that is currently unable to distinguish neuro-models from real ones. At the same time, Alexander believes the trend for artificial characters is long-term.
«No ageism, but young people identify such content more easily. People who work with AI, in visuals, see patterns of neural networks in photos or videos, as well as minor glitches in generations,» the designer explained. «Neural networks develop every day, but social media content also evolves. People already have a demand for a more »sloppy«, natural style, which is difficult for neural networks to replicate because AI is not trained on such content. The value of naturalness will continue to grow. Possibly, over time neural networks will learn, but people will develop a demand for something else. This is a kind of race where AI will always be catching up.»
Are Neuro-Models Here to Stay?
Marketer Tamara Pospelova noted that the fashion for unusual appearance is a way to hook the viewer.
«People now strive to be like each other, to meet standards. And when a model that stands out strongly appears in the general flow of autopilot information perception, of course, it catches the eye: pay attention, what if it»s dangerous? That«s how the psyche works. They also create advertisements with unexpected shapes, elements, colors. The way to attract attention is to be unlike everyone else,» she added.
The marketer also explained that models now encounter less hate thanks to the audience«s media literacy. Society, especially the younger generation, thanks to film culture and mass media, is getting used to diversity and learning to accept different people.
«When accounts gain popularity, become more mainstream — hate will surely come. When content begins to penetrate conservative society, which does not accept innovations, changes, other views, then negativity and criticism appear, because for them, from a psychological point of view, it can be dangerous,» explained the marketer.
The expert added that AI models are popular as a new trend, but within about six months, viewers will learn to distinguish them from real ones much better.
«A huge number of examples are appearing, the brain learns to compare. Remember how it was with auto-dialers, chat bots? We also didn»t learn to distinguish them from real interlocutors right away. As for the longevity of this phenomenon, I believe that the audience and brands have a greater demand for naturalness, we want to see real people — the mass market focuses on them. Marketers from various analytical agencies also predict that content with real models and actors will cost more because it will be more complex in production, and it will be more in demand by expensive, quality brands,« thinks Tamara Pospelova.
Lately, social media users have become so vigilant that they even suspect real content of being AI-generated. For example, singer Klava Koka had to justify that the new music video was filmed live.
Earlier, an AI specialist answered naive questions about neural networks.
* The social network is banned in the Russian Federation.
