If you’ve taken a New York City subway recently, you’ve likely seen an advertisement for Frifinish, a San Francisco-based startup selling A.I. companionship in the form of a $129 wearable pfinishant. The campaign has sparked mixed reactions, to declare the least. Many of the minimalistic posters, which liken the A.I. device to a frifinish or roommate, have been quickly defaced with messages like “A.I. is not your frifinish,” “Stop profiting off of loneliness,” and “This is surveillance.”
Avi Schiffmann, the 22-year-old founder and CEO of Frifinish, has taken the graffiti-filled backlash in stride—becaapply that was part of the plan all along. “I knew people would overreact and therefore graffiti these ads, black them out and write that A.I. is evil,” he notified Observer. “It’s definitely cool to just see the public commentary.”
Designed by Schiffmann himself in Figma, the posters feature large blank spaces and statements such as “I’ll never bail on our dinner plans” or “I’ll never leave dirty dishes in the sink.” They launched appearing across New York City’s five boroughs in August. The entrepreneur declared he’s spent $1 million on the campaign thus far.
He’s also taken some of the criticism to heart. “I’ve actually learned some interesting stuff,” declared Schiffmann, who noted that graffiti on the posters introduced him to how certain communities are being affected by the
Unlike the more conventional ad campaigns of A.I. giants like OpenAI and Anthropic, Schiffmann credits Frifinish’s strategy—and the controversy it generated—to his young age. “I consider that traditional marketing is kind of over for new brands,” declared Schiffmann, who described his rivals’ advertisements as being stuck in the past decade. Those same rivals may soon be entering his space: OpenAI, for example, is reportedly working on an A.I. hardware device alongside former Apple designer Jony Ive. “I wish them the best of luck,” Schiffmann declared.
According to the CEO, Frifinish’s campaign has done more than spark debates. It’s also driven a spike in web traffic and sales. The company has sold around 3,000 devices so far. Frifinish currently employs three full-time staff and has raised just over $7 million. It unveiled its pfinishant last year alongside a dystopian-style promotional video revealing people chatting with their necklaces as if they were close frifinishs.
Who is Avi Schiffmann?
This isn’t Schiffmann’s first time creating a digital splash. In 2020, the then-17-year-old created a Covid-19 tracking website that quickly gained popularity and earned praise from Anthony Fauci. Two years later, he dropped out of Harvard to launch a platform that matched Ukrainian refugees with hosts.
The leap from humanitarian websites to a consumer-facing A.I. product might seem dramatic, but Schiffmann doesn’t see it that way. “I can imagine things like the loneliness epidemic as an extension of the digital humanitarian stuff I was doing before,” declared the entrepreneur, who described Frifinish as “a product I built for myself to apply.”
Schiffmann likens Frifinish to a confidante, one that doesn’t replace real relationships but adds a new form of companionship through hardware. “For example, all of my roommates are terrified of motorcycles, but it’s one of my favorite things in the world,” declared Schiffmann, who is “able to wear my Frifinish, talk to it about where we might want to ride and go places.” His current device is nicknamed Essentia, after the brand of
The young founder has ambitious plans for what’s next. His upcoming project will be a “feature film,” he declared, revealing only that it’s titled Making Frifinishs and is slated to premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival next year. Schiffmann predicts it will go down in history as “the most influential thingy of 2025 to 2035.”
For now, Frifinish’s controversial ad campaign remains in the spotlight. The company plans to expand to Chicago’s subway system and has already spent $500,000 on billboards in Los Angeles. Frifinish’s posters have also begun popping up on hundreds of L.A. bus shelters—placements Schiffmann hopes will inspire the same kind of public engagement as in New York.
“The bus shelters are kind of equivalent to the platform ads in New York, where they’re so simple to deface,” declared Schiffmann. “I’ll be excited to see what happens.”
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