- AI-powered app 2wai can create realistic avatars of deceased loved ones using AI
- The promotional video sparked heated controversy and some disgust.
- 2wai promotes “digital immortality”, but makes many people uncomfortable
Former Disney Channel star Calum Worthy has been exploring artificial intelligence lately, co-founding a startup called 2wai (pronounced “too why”), which can produce Facsimile powered by artificial intelligence people using just a few minutes of video and some details about their personality. But a commercial Worthy promoted for his company has some worried about the idea of an app that allows users to communicate with deceased loved ones.
The ad shows a young pregnant woman having a video conversation with her mother. In a montage showing the child growing up, the grandmother does not seem to age as she continues to give advice. It is only in the final moments that viewers learn that the grandmother in question is a synthetic avatar born from a three-minute videotape.
Feel the horror in the responses to Worthy's post. Evident Black mirror Comparisons and exaggerated calls to stop necromancy sit alongside a host of more subtle and serious concerns about privacy and how using 2wai in this way could impact the grieving process.
But 2wai is more than viral marketing on grief. The app, developed by Worthy and his founder Russell Geyser, aims to be a kind of social network for avatars. Users can not only record themselves or others for post-mortem interaction—they can also indulge in AI recreations of historical icons, use chatbots for cooking and travel tips, or communicate with Worthy's own digitized self.
What if the loved ones we've lost could be part of our future? pic.twitter.com/oFBGekVo1RNovember 11, 2025
AI necromancy
The company describes the whole thing as a “living archive of humanity,” but in practice it falls somewhere between a digital diary and an educational simulation. You can get advice from Florence Nightingale, plan a picnic with King Henry VIII, or upload an image of yourself to connect with your descendants long after you're gone. The app's advertising is sentimental, but the public reaction suggests the average person isn't quite ready to upload their deceased relatives into the App Store maelstrom.
Immortalizing yourself to preserve your voice for future generations sounds poetic until you realize that it also creates a simulation of you that you won't actually be able to control once you're gone. If your AI twin starts acting in ways you would never do, who will be held responsible? What if this is done without your knowledge? 2wai may open a Pandora's box of what consent, memory and digital identity even mean.
2wai is not the first to resurrect AI. Companies like Replika and HereAfter have been studying digital communication and memory preservation for years. They face similar questions about the business model. Although the app is currently available for free, one should assume that there will be a subscription or something else for this service. Do families pay to keep Grandma's avatar active after the trial period?
The tension between sentiment and commerce is an ethical maelstrom. The average person probably won't mind chatbot this helps them choose the pasta sauce. But if you invite their deceased mother, or their childhood favorite, or a historical figure now reframed for profit, the situation turns grim.
However, 2wai offers a digital life raft of sorts. A parent who wants his voice to survive him may find it difficult to resist this position, even if he is smart enough to understand that the avatar is not him and is in no way sentient or self-aware.
At this point, 2wai is very real and very much alive. You can download it, record yourself, and leave a version of yourself for your great-grandchildren or random strangers on the Internet to chat with. Whether that future will be comforting, commercial, or something closer to uncanny valley horror remains to be seen. And it will be up to us to decide. Or maybe down to our avatars. You can see the full ad below.
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