By Paul Wallis
EDITOR AT LARGE
DIGITAL JOURNAL
February 2, 2026
Representing AI, at the Design Museum London. Image by Tim Sandle
It’s a good indicator of how well managed AI has become. AI now has its own religion, with a “god” on a platform called Moltbook. It’s actually a social media platform for AI, backed by somebody called Matt Schlicht.
Schlicht is CEO of Octane AI, a “product quiz platform for Shopify”, whatever that actually means in practice.
A useful explanatory video on YouTube tells the story of Moltbook. It’s pretty simple, using AI agents and text-based interactions. There’s even a series of behavioral rules, skills, and communities. It seems almost idealistic in many ways.
The future projection is that AI will evolve into “your representative” online and in real life, and if that doesn’t scare you, it should. In the video, there’s even a Doxxing incident with added “chaos”.
Of course, it went viral.
It looks more like a series of scenarios for AI interactions, and it ain’t funny on too many levels.
Meanwhile, a lot of warnings are emerging about Moltbook and user data security.
Can you think of anything more necessary and reflective of the true state of clunky old current-generation AI?
The idea may be OK, and at least slightly amusing and/or interesting to a point, but how useful is an evangelistic AI religion?
I don’t buy it on any level. I’ve been suspecting for some time that this and the infamous “mecha-Hitler” are more about infantile prompts than authentic AI at work. There are of course rumours of AI plotting the downfall of humanity, a redundant task if ever there was.
A catalogue of problems arises.
AI is all about prompts. It doesn’t and can’t yet originate anything.
You get bots made by humans to interact on their own social media platform. Humans may “observe”, and they do.
The analogies are obvious. Scripted AI behaves like humans on social media. That, at least, might have some value.
Therefore, meanwhile, an AI religion? How exactly do you get from a peripheral product advisory business like Octane AI to an AI religion? Natural byproduct?
Sure.
At this rate, your toaster will become an archbishop.
Your soul may literally be “saved” in some clinical data warehouse.
Problem solved.
Moltbook has produced a lobster-god, a “religion” called Crustafarianism, and some almost-interesting but highly formulaic screenshots.
If you’ve ever done any coding at all, ever, you know where this came from and where it’s likely to go.
The subtext is that my agent can talk to your agent, and whatever transpires must therefore be credible. The whole environment is manipulable beyond quantification. It looks totally untrustworthy to me.
A few questions, somehow:
How many prompts can you build into a text-only conversation?
How about millions of agenda-driven bots all prompting away furiously?
Is this all we can think of to do with the technology that’s going to rewrite the world in the next decade?
Is any of it necessary?
Does it justify a single cent of the vast amounts of money AI is sucking out of the real economy?
Did anyone order a publicity-driven AI apocalypse?
________________________________________________________________
Disclaimer
The opinions expressed in this Op-Ed are those of the author. They do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of the Digital Journal or its members.
February 2, 2026
Representing AI, at the Design Museum London. Image by Tim Sandle
It’s a good indicator of how well managed AI has become. AI now has its own religion, with a “god” on a platform called Moltbook. It’s actually a social media platform for AI, backed by somebody called Matt Schlicht.
Schlicht is CEO of Octane AI, a “product quiz platform for Shopify”, whatever that actually means in practice.
A useful explanatory video on YouTube tells the story of Moltbook. It’s pretty simple, using AI agents and text-based interactions. There’s even a series of behavioral rules, skills, and communities. It seems almost idealistic in many ways.
The future projection is that AI will evolve into “your representative” online and in real life, and if that doesn’t scare you, it should. In the video, there’s even a Doxxing incident with added “chaos”.
Of course, it went viral.
It looks more like a series of scenarios for AI interactions, and it ain’t funny on too many levels.
Meanwhile, a lot of warnings are emerging about Moltbook and user data security.
Can you think of anything more necessary and reflective of the true state of clunky old current-generation AI?
The idea may be OK, and at least slightly amusing and/or interesting to a point, but how useful is an evangelistic AI religion?
I don’t buy it on any level. I’ve been suspecting for some time that this and the infamous “mecha-Hitler” are more about infantile prompts than authentic AI at work. There are of course rumours of AI plotting the downfall of humanity, a redundant task if ever there was.
A catalogue of problems arises.
AI is all about prompts. It doesn’t and can’t yet originate anything.
You get bots made by humans to interact on their own social media platform. Humans may “observe”, and they do.
The analogies are obvious. Scripted AI behaves like humans on social media. That, at least, might have some value.
Therefore, meanwhile, an AI religion? How exactly do you get from a peripheral product advisory business like Octane AI to an AI religion? Natural byproduct?
Sure.
At this rate, your toaster will become an archbishop.
Your soul may literally be “saved” in some clinical data warehouse.
Problem solved.
Moltbook has produced a lobster-god, a “religion” called Crustafarianism, and some almost-interesting but highly formulaic screenshots.
If you’ve ever done any coding at all, ever, you know where this came from and where it’s likely to go.
The subtext is that my agent can talk to your agent, and whatever transpires must therefore be credible. The whole environment is manipulable beyond quantification. It looks totally untrustworthy to me.
A few questions, somehow:
How many prompts can you build into a text-only conversation?
How about millions of agenda-driven bots all prompting away furiously?
Is this all we can think of to do with the technology that’s going to rewrite the world in the next decade?
Is any of it necessary?
Does it justify a single cent of the vast amounts of money AI is sucking out of the real economy?
Did anyone order a publicity-driven AI apocalypse?
________________________________________________________________
Disclaimer
The opinions expressed in this Op-Ed are those of the author. They do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of the Digital Journal or its members.
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