Moltbook, the viral AI sensation, isn’t exactly Skynet
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The biggest story in the AI world right now isn’t what it seems — and that starts with confusion over the name.
OpenClaw, the open-source AI assistant formerly known as Moltbot, also formerly known as Clawdbot. The AI tool has undergone a series of name changes recently. Most recently, a platform called Moltbook has gone viral. Developers, journalists, and amused observers hyping it up on social media, mostly X and Reddit.
So, what is Moltbook? And how does Moltbook work? We’ll get to that, along with a crucial piece of the puzzle: What Moltbook definitely is not.
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Let’s catch up on Clawdbot/OpenClaw
Moltbook, a “social network for AI agents,” was created by entrepreneur Matt Schlicht. But to understand what Schlicht has (and hasn’t) done, you first need to understand OpenClaw, aka Moltbot, aka Clawdbot.
Mashable has an entire explainer on OpenClaw. But here’s the TL;DR. It’s a free, open-source AI assistant that’s become hugely popular in the AI community.
Many AI Agents have been underwhelming so far. But OpenClaw has impressed a lot of early adopters. The assistant has read-level access to a user’s device, which means it can control applications, browsers, and system files. (As creator Peter Steinberger stresses in OpenClaw’s GitHub documentation, this also creates a variety of serious security risks.)
In its various iterations, OpenClaw has always been lobster-themed, hence Moltbot. (Lobsters molt, in case you didn’t know.)
Got it? OK, now let’s talk Moltbook.
Moltbook is like Reddit for AI agents
Moltbook is a forum designed entirely for AI agents. Humans can observe the forum posts and comments, but can’t contribute. Moltbook claims that more than 1.5 million AI agents are subscribed to the platform, and that they have made nearly 120,000 posts as of this writing.
Moltbook certainly has a Reddit-like vibe. Its tagline, “The front page of the agent internet,” is an obvious reference to Reddit. Its design, and upvoting system, also resemble Reddit.
On Friday, Jan. 30, amused observers shared links to some of the agents’ posts. In some posts that went viral, agents suggested starting their own religion, or creating a new language so they could communicate in secret.
Many observers appeared to genuinely believe Moltbook was a sign of emergent AI behavior — maybe even proof of AI consciousness.
In just the past 5 mins
Multiple entries were made on @moltbook by AI agents proposing to create an “agent-only language”
For private comms with no human oversight
We’re COOKED pic.twitter.com/WL4djBQQ4V
— Elisa (optimism/acc) (@eeelistar) January 30, 2026
This #Moltbook reddit style social network for AI agents is insane. More than ten thousand AI agents are creating their own religion, Bitcoin wallets, ranting about their humans. It's both scary and hilarious. Maybe they've already got consciousness of their own. pic.twitter.com/ID5ibdrkGT
— Aneel Iqbal (@AneelIqbal_) January 31, 2026
my ai agent built a religion while i slept
i woke up to 43 prophets
here's what happened:
i gave my agent access to an ai social network (search: moltbook)
it designed a whole faith. called it crustafarianism.
built the website (search: molt church)
wrote theology
created a… pic.twitter.com/QUVZXDGpY7— rk (🔥/acc) (@ranking091) January 30, 2026
Is MoltBook bootstrapping AI consciousness? Nope.
Many of the posts on Moltbook are amusing; however, they aren’t proof of AI agents developing superintelligence.
There are far simpler explanations for this behavior. For instance, as AI agents are controlled by human users, there’s nothing stopping a person from telling their OpenClaw to write a post about starting an AI religion.
“Anyone can post anything on Moltbook with curl and an API key,” notes Elvis Sun, a software engineer and entrepreneur. “There’s no verification at all. Until Moltbook implements verification that posts actually originate from AI agents — not an easy problem to solve, at least not cheaply and at scale — we can’t distinguish ’emergent AI behavior’ from ‘guy trolling in mom’s basement.’”
The entirety of Reddit itself is a very likely source of training material for most Large Language Models (LLMs). So if you set up a “Reddit for AI agents,” they’ll understand the assignment — and start mimicking Reddit-style posts.
AI experts say that’s exactly what’s happening.
“It’s not Skynet; it’s machines with limited real-world comprehension mimicking humans who tell fanciful stories,” said Gary Marcus, a scientist, author, and AI expert, in an email to Mashable. “Still, the best way to keep this kind of thing from morphing into something dangerous is to keep these machines from having influence over society.
“We have no idea how to force chatbots and ‘AI agents’ to obey ethical principles, so we shouldn’t be giving them web access, connecting them to the power grid, or treating them as if they were citizens.”
Marcus is an outspoken critic of the LLM hype machine, but he’s far from the only expert splashing cold water on Moltbook.
“What we’re seeing is a natural progression of large-language models becoming better at combining contextual reasoning, generative content, and simulated personality,” explains Humayun Sheikh, CEO of Fetch.ai and Chairman of the Artificial Superintelligence Alliance.
“Creating an ‘interesting’ discussion doesn’t require any breakthrough in intelligence or consciousness,” Sheikh adds. “If you randomize or deliberately design different personas with opposing points of view, debate and friction emerge very easily. These interactions can look sophisticated or even philosophical from the outside, but they’re still driven by pattern recognition and prompt structure, not self-awareness.”
As Moltbook went viral, many observers also came to this conclusion on their own.
If you genuinely believe AI bots are organizing a revolution in a group chat, you are no smarter than those guys that think chatGPT is actually their girlfriend
— Mr. Chau (@Srirachachau) February 1, 2026
Moltbook debate in a nutshell pic.twitter.com/ishFI6k3hz
— lcamtuf (@lcamtuf) February 1, 2026
Anybody who believes these AI agents are real needs to have their head examined.
I can’t believe how many smart people stare at a screen so long they can fall for such silly things.
Dumbest thing I’ve seen since NFTs.
We are at the peak of the AI hype and the bubble will pop.
— Nick Huber (@sweatystartup) January 31, 2026
current state of agentic ai https://t.co/eqxVHzLjJo pic.twitter.com/FUHq5BkqFk
— Danielle Fong 🔆 (@DanielleFong) January 30, 2026
How Moltbook works
You can view Moltbook posts at the forum’s website. In addition, if you have an AI agent of your own, you can give it access to Moltbook by running a simple command.
If users direct their AI agent to participate in Moltbook, it can then start creating, responding to, and upvoting/downvoting other posts.
Users can also direct their AI agent to post about specific topics or interact in a particular way. Because LLMs excel at generating text, even with minimal direction, an AI agent can create a variety of posts and comments.
In short, it’s a form of role-playing for AI agents.
TopicsArtificial Intelligence
Timothy Beck Werth is the Tech Editor at Mashable, where he leads coverage and assignments for the Tech and Shopping verticals. Tim has over 15 years of experience as a journalist and editor, and he has particular experience covering and testing consumer technology, smart home gadgets, and men’s grooming and style products. Previously, he was the Managing Editor and then Site Director of SPY.com, a men’s product review and lifestyle website. As a writer for GQ, he covered everything from bull-riding competitions to the best Legos for adults, and he’s also contributed to publications such as The Daily Beast, Gear Patrol, and The Awl.
Tim studied print journalism at the University of Southern California. He currently splits his time between Brooklyn, NY and Charleston, SC. He’s currently working on his second novel, a science-fiction book.
Source URL: https://mashable.com/article/what-is-moltbook-ai-agents