AI‑engineered Friendship Platforms

AI startups are experimenting with subscription services that algorithmically assemble curated, in‑person social experiences (dinners, museum visits, facilitated groups) to manufacture friendship and reduce loneliness. These services position themselves as low‑cost social capital providers, implicitly competing with college as a place where enduring peer groups form. — If these platforms scale they could disrupt higher education’s social role, reshape youth socialization, and create a commercial substitute for formative civic networks — with implications for marriage, mental health, and inequality.