A baffling clip of a woman on a TikTok live stream licking the air and saying “Ice cream so good” while using a straightener to pop single kernels of popcorn has gone viral and people are confused. By now, we all know the internet is filled with weird and wonderful things, but sometimes there are viral videos that are particularly odd and require an explanation. One such video includes a TikTok live video made by @pinkydollreal, who appears to be a 19-year-old Montreal-based user. In it, she appeared to be repeating words like, “yes, yes, yes”, “slay” and “ice cream so good”, while also receiving payments, or “gifts”, from users watching in real-time. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter The bizarre clip was shared on Twitter along with the caption, “Any time I accidentally happen upon a TikTok live, I feel like I am watching the world end” and was viewed millions of times, before the person deleted it, explaining they didn’t want @pinkydollreal to receive hate. But, other people have also been sharing the TikToker's content, with one person calling it the “weirdest thing I’ve seen [on TikTok] by far”. What is @pinkydollreal’s content and why does it appear “weird”? The content that TikToker is producing is part of a genre called NPC, or non-playable character. The reference comes from video games and refers to characters that feature but are unable to be controlled by the person playing the game. The niche genre on TikTok sees users like @pinkydollreal imitating an NPC by repeating many of the same phrases and movements in a way that appears programmed and looped. Their behaviour has set patterns and the person rarely deviates from a handful of sayings or actions to imitate a programmed character. Some people pay NPC TikTokers because the content can be considered a fetish. While the content is not overtly sexual, with no nudity or sexual langue, some who are attracted to certain things may find it arousing. Instagram sexual educator Emerson Karsh explained to InsideHook: “A fetish is a little bit more specialized. It’s attraction or arousal or sexual stimulation to certain stimuli, especially if it’s non-sexual. So, like non-sexual body parts, or inanimate objects or non-sexual situations.” Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

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One of the pioneers of artificial intelligence has warned the government is not safeguarding against the dangers posed by future super-intelligent machines. Professor Stuart Russell told The Times ministers were favouring a light touch on the burgeoning AI industry, despite warnings from civil servants it could create an existential threat. A former adviser to both Downing Street and the White House, Prof Russell is a co-author of the most widely used AI textbook and lectures on computer science at the University of California, Berkeley. He told The Times a system similar to ChatGPT – which has passed exams and can compose prose – could form part of a super-intelligence machine which could not be controlled. “How do you maintain power over entities more powerful than you – forever?” he asked. “If you don’t have an answer, then stop doing the research. It’s as simple as that. “The stakes couldn’t be higher: if we don’t control our own civilisation, we have no say in whether we continue to exist.” In March, he co-signed an open letter with Elon Musk and Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak warning of the “out-of-control race” going on at AI labs. The letter warned the labs were developing “ever more powerful digital minds that no one, not even their creators, can understand, predict or reliably control”. Prof Russell has worked for the UN on a system to monitor the nuclear test-ban treaty and was asked to work with the Government earlier this year. “The Foreign Office … talked to a lot of people and they concluded that loss of control was a plausible and extremely high-significance outcome,” he said. “And then the government came out with a regulatory approach that says: ‘Nothing to see here… we’ll welcome the AI industry as if we were talking about making cars or something like that’.” He said making changes to the technical foundations of AI to add necessary safeguards would take “time that we may not have”. “I think we got something wrong right at the beginning, where we were so enthralled by the notion of understanding and creating intelligence, we didn’t think about what that intelligence was going to be for,” he said. We've sort of got the message and we're scrambling around trying to figure out what to do Professor Stuart Russell “Unless its only purpose is to be a benefit to humans, you are actually creating a competitor – and that would be obviously a stupid thing to do. “We don’t want systems that imitate human behaviour… you’re basically training it to have human-like goals and to pursue those goals. “You can only imagine how disastrous it would be to have really capable systems that were pursuing those kinds of goals.” He said there were signs of politicians becoming aware of the risks. “We’ve sort of got the message and we’re scrambling around trying to figure out what to do,” he said. “That’s what it feels like right now.” The government has launched the AI Foundation Model Taskforce which it says will “lay the foundations for the safe use of foundation models across the economy and ensure the UK is at the forefront of this pivotal AI technology”. Read More ChatGPT creators try to use artificial intelligence to explain itself – and come across major problems Artificial intelligence could ‘transform’ heart attack diagnosis, scientists say Hackers aim to find flaws in AI - with White House help ChatGPT user in China detained for creating and spreading fake news, police say Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live