In the Weights: AI Transforms Vanity Search

The contemporary experience of "Googling oneself" often lacks its former impact. While the evolving nature of Google search itself plays a role, there's an undeniable shift in how information about individuals is disseminated, with large language models and chatbots increasingly serving as significant sources alongside traditional web searches.

This evolving digital landscape resonated with Thomas Dimson and Joey Flynn, inspiring them to create "In the Weights." The platform, named after the "weights" — the numerical parameters that shape an AI model’s training and output — aims to measure an AI's intrinsic ability to recall an individual without relying on external tools like web search.

As the website articulates, "Being in the weights means your existence was deemed important in the process of creating superhuman artificial intelligence."

To accomplish this, In the Weights queries a diverse array of AI models, including Grok, Gemini, multiple versions of GPT, Claude, Llama, and other less prominent systems. It poses a question such as, “Who is ? Give up to 10 results, each with a short description and confidence.” The platform then "cluster[s] similar descriptions together and assign[s] a strength score."

For instance, this tech blogger achieved a strength score of 641, positioning them within the top 6% of evaluated names. This initial satisfaction was tempered by the discovery that several TechCrunch colleagues attained even higher scores. The leaderboard is dynamic, with "Home Alone" actor Macaulay Culkin currently leading with a strength score of 988, closely followed by opera singer Luciano Pavarotti.

Beyond scores, the results indicate which specific models provided information for a given name and also reveal instances of potential AI hallucination. For example, GPT-5.4 Mini reportedly identified "Anthony Ha" as an “ambiguous name form that could refer to multiple people with the initials A.H.A.”

When asked about the project's genesis, Dimson explained to TechCrunch via email that he and Flynn sought to “get the creative juices flowing again” after their departure from OpenAI, an organization they joined following the acquisition of their design startup, Global Illumination.

Dimson elaborated on his motivations, noting that "Google vanity searches are the wrong objective in 2026 as more traffic moves to LLMs," and pondering how "so many lives are encoded somehow in a bunch of floating point numbers inside the AI brain." He added that the site's concept was "sealed" by a satirical blog post that creatively intertwined AI weights with Terry Bisson’s renowned short story, “They’re Made Out of Meat.”

"Reception has been insane so far," Dimson commented. "We thought this would be a mild curiosity but it seems like it has struck a nerve of wanting to see if you live forever in the super intelligence (the comparison factor doesn’t hurt either!)."

While the notion of chatbot "remembrance" as a path to immortality remains unconvincing to this writer, the results are undeniably intriguing and even provoke a sense of competitive envy, particularly given their representation as easily comparable scores. (AI critic Anthony Moser, however, dismissed the concept, stating it’s “literally the same as asking 13 chatbots to tell you about yourself.”) The site's charming, Nintendo-inspired retro design also contributes to its appeal.

Dimson outlined future plans to further investigate discrepancies in results among models within the same series, identify biases in models towards specific demographics, and pinpoint individuals who, in his view, “should have a Wikipedia article but don’t.”