Inside the tech-savvy lives of AI model creators earning thousands of dollars generating 'dream girls'

Steven Jones' porn business, which once netted him half a million in revenue per month, fell apart in 2013 amid stiff competition from free streamers like Pornhub.  

But the self-described science-fiction nerd now says he's getting back into the adult content game, thanks to artificial intelligence (AI) which he's leveraging to help customers make bespoke pornography depicting their AI-generated 'dream girls.'

More chaste AI-generated models, created by a marketing team in Barcelona, Spain, are already minting between $11,000 and $3,200 a month in advertising deals.

Welcome to the brave new world of post-human modelling, where 'posing' joins the ranks of big box store retail and rocket manufacturing among the industries where managers profit off a labor force of unpaid machines and virtual employees.

Right now, these AI-crafted models are already realistic enough to fool people who see models up close much more than the rest of us.

'One day, a well-known Latin American actor texted to ask her out,' according to the Barcelona-based AI-model designer.

Rubén Cruz said he and his business partners, Aitana's other designer Diana Núñez (center), and the AI model's Social Media Manager, Sofía Novales (right), decided to pivot to AI models for their Instagram 'influencer' marketing firm over the hassle of human diva personalities

Their firm, The Clueless Agency, has struck gold with the AI-model Aitana López (above). The team has also created a second virtual model called Maia, who is 'a little more shy.' Both names were picked to sneakily reference their 'AI' ancestry

That designer, Rubén Cruz, who constructed the AI-model Aitana López and founded the agency that 'manages her career,' The Clueless Agency, said he recognized the celebrity fan sliding into Aitana's DMs instantly. 

'This actor has about 5 million followers and some of our team watched his TV series when they were kids,' Cruz told Euronews. 

'He had no idea Aitana didn't exist,' he added. 

Cruz said he and his business partners — Aitana's other designer Diana Núñez, and the AI model's Social Media Manager, Sofía Novales — decided to pivot to AI models for their Instagram influencer marketing over the hassle of human diva personalities.

'We did it so that we could make a better living and not be dependent on other people who have egos, who have manias,' according to Cruz, 'or who just want to make a lot of money by posing.' 

Behind the scenes, every week, Cruz and The Clueless team have a meeting to plan out the next Instagram-worthy moments of Aitana's fictional life. They decide what destinations she might travel to, what she might wear, and what personal information she might share

But, not unlike AI porn impresario Steven Jones, Cruz said that part of his own impetus was financial. 

As Euronews put it, Cruz was 'going through a rough patch because he didn't have many clients.'

Behind the scenes, every week, Cruz and The Clueless team have a meeting to plan out the next Instagram-worthy moments of Aitana's fictional life. 

They decide what jet-setting destinations she might travel to, what she might wear, and what personal information she might share to her over 300,000 followers.

'In the first month, we realized that people follow lives, not images,' Cruz said. 

'Since she is not alive, we had to give her a bit of reality so that people could relate to her in some way. We had to tell a story.'

After a decade out of porn, self-described science-fiction nerd Steven Jones says he's getting back into the adult content game, thanks to AI - which he's leveraging to help customers make bespoke smut depicting their AI-generated 'dream girls' (above Jones' deepfake.com site) 

READ MORE: Exclusive! Sexy AI-generated influencers are silently swarming social media with fake names, backstories and just one goal — to con desperate men 

DailyMail.com uncovered several AI influencers who are aspiring virtual models, online girlfriends and are asking for tips. Some of the digital designs offer plans to purchase their nudes. 

Story matters for Steven Jones' more adult, AI-generated modelling business as well, but the day-to-day focus is less coming up with ideas than policing his customers' own worst impulses.  

Although his new company's in-house AI-image maker has guardrails to help prevent users from rendering child pornography, acts of violence or celebrity 'deepfakes,' Jones said that the perverse ingenuity of his customers keeps him up at night.

'I see certain things people type in, and I just hope to God they're trying to test the model, like we are,' Jones told the Washington Post.

'I hope they don't actually want to see the things they're typing in.'

Customers of his new sites, like deepfake.com and porn.ai, he said, are constantly developing cunning workarounds, and sometimes they work. 

One example, as he told the Post, was the 'adult woman with no breasts,' which users appeared to use in an effort to create 'childlike' characters for their sick and illegal, pedophile fantasies. 

Jones said he and his staff pull images that other users of his sites' flag as abusive. 

Their current list of blocked AI-image generating prompts already contains 1,000 terms, including 'high school,' despite how new their sites are.

Jones started his new AI porn businesses with an old business partner for about $550,000, but as he told the Post he also obtained funding from an angel investor that he declined to name.