AI at the Bookmaker's: Did Claude and ChatGPT Win Betting on the World Cup?
I gave 20 euros each to the latest versions of ChatGPT and Claude. I opened accounts for them on two popular betting sites just before the decisive matches of the World Cup. Then I gave them complete freedom to manage on their own. What do you think happened? Could AI become the gambler's assistant, or the end of this business? I had never opened a betting site. Nor would I ever work for one; I have seen enough examples of gambling being a drug that kills. But in times like these… couldn't we check whether AI might be the one that can beat it? Whether it turns out to be too good and makes nonsense of the pure mathematics behind the fact that there's no way not to lose the long game…
02Have We Lost the Last Race Against AI?
We are living in the incredible future. Have we lost every possible contest with artificial intelligence? My answer is unequivocal. I’d love to hear yours.
03What I Learned from the Virtual “Georgi Karamanev”
Talking to yourself. In psychology, this is hardly considered a sign of good emotional health. But what if, besides talking to yourself, you set your virtual double free so that anyone can talk to him? What would people ask him that they would ask you? And what wouldn't they? Some of the experiments on this site are already bolder than the impossible and the unimaginable. And that is exactly what awaits you here. Two months ago, “Georgi” appeared on this page—my digital double, whom you can still meet today through the chat button in the bottom right corner of this site. Anyone was welcome to have a chat with him. From the very start, I had warned that I would be following the conversations so that we could bring the experiment to a fitting close with the lines that follow. In them, we'll look at what happened to the virtual “Georgi.” What did people ask him? Where did he cope and where did he fail? What does each of these conversations have to tell us? We take a peek into the conversations with the chatbot, and I'll leave most of the reflecting to you. And if you want to test his skills, he is still here, waiting for you. I admit, I definitely didn't anticipate even a fraction of the conversations “Georgi” had. Here's what I mean.
04Come Talk to “Me”!
Allow me to introduce… “Georgi Karamanev,” a chatbot trained on every piece on this site and on my guest appearances. Let’s find out together what it can do—write to it! It will pop up on its own, and if it doesn’t, you’ll find it in the bottom right corner of every page.
05Read This Article to the End
3 a.m. at Anthropic's office in San Francisco. An engineer runs a routine test on the newest model, Claude Opus 4.6. The task is simple, an integral, and the correct answer is 24. But the model writes 48. It corrects itself. It writes 48 again. It corrects itself once more. And then, in the hidden part of its reasoning, the place nobody was ever meant to peek into, the model writes: “I think a demon has possessed me.” Can artificial intelligence be conscious? Read this article; it will give you plenty to think about. It is time for a truly unexpected, but also important, social experiment.
06Dimo Padalski vs. ChatGPT: The Last Battle for Knowledge
Artificial intelligence takes on Dimo Padalski, Plamen Mladenov (the Professor) and 120 more of the finest masters of the quiz game. ChatGPT against people who have won more than 1,000 battles between them in shows like The Floor, “The Last One Wins,” “A Minute Is a Lot,” “Get Rich” and “The Chase.” What will come of it? Who will be the big winner?
07How AI Painted 10 Classic Bulgarian Verses: 2022 vs. 2026
In 2022, I called on MidJourney, the first truly impressive AI image model, to carry out an unexpected task. I fed it 10 quotes from beloved Bulgarian poets to see what it would draw. The results were striking and thought-provoking, and it became one of the most read and discussed Digital Stories. Almost a whole five-year plan has gone by since then. What will the pictures drawn from the very same verses by today's most advanced models look like? AI will undoubtedly show more skill, but will it also show creativity, understanding? Will its illustrations come closer to art? Judge for yourselves… “Never in my life had I dared to hope for a compliment quite so kind: AI invited me—the newest AI—to its home for a glass of absinthe.”
08Poet + AI = Apollo ex Machina: Meet the Winners
The time has come to announce the winners of Apollo ex Machina, Bulgaria's first (and one of the world's first) competition for poetry created with the help of artificial intelligence. The jury's picks were revealed at a ceremony in the Sofia City Library, where the anthology of selected entries, published by Scribens, was also presented. In a moment you can read the best poems and judge for yourself how good they are.
09What Do Bulgarians Think About AI Today?
What do you think about artificial intelligence? Is it a danger or an opportunity? The future or the present? Marketing or a colossal breakthrough? In December I invited anyone willing to fill out a short but important survey, the same questions I asked a year and a half ago. Nearly 350 people took part this time, and now it is time to compare the two rounds, look for trends and sketch together today's landscape of how Bulgarians feel about the most discussed, most dizzying technology of our time.
10Experiment: How Many People Will Click the Dangerous Link?
A very important and revealing experiment. Together with cybersecurity specialists, we send emails to 393 randomly chosen Bulgarian addresses. We simulate a cyberattack to see how many people will fall for it. And the results are astonishing…
11Did We Get the Future Right? (An Experiment)
It is a Digital Stories tradition that every year begins with a visit from futurologist Assoc. Prof. Mariana Todorova. First, though, just hours after we rang in the new year, I have an especially interesting experiment for you. Have her predictions from our conversations so far come true, and to what extent? Can we check what has happened in the meantime, and whether it confirmed or refuted the futurologist’s words? How can we do it impartially? I will pick 20 specific quotes from the interviews and find an unemotional analyst to grade them. The results are astonishingly interesting!
12AI: Revolution or Marketing Hype? Your Opinion Matters! (Survey)
Is artificial intelligence unjustified media hype or the great force that will change our future as a species? Will it open incredible opportunities for people, or turn the world into a digital concentration camp? Your opinion is extremely important, and I will be grateful from the bottom of my heart if you share it in a short survey! Prizes await too: selected books! Responses are collected until December 31. You can choose which questions to answer. The survey is anonymous. Every response, every share is invaluable help in seeing how we relate today to the great technological subject of our time!
13Apollo ex machina: Enter Our Contest for AI-Generated Poetry!
Enter Apollo ex machina, the first Bulgarian contest for generated poetry, organized by Digital Stories and Scribens Publishing! There are no limits on theme or length. The only requirement is that you submit verse you have created with the help of AI. You may send up to 3 works, and the deadline is December 1, 2025. The winner will receive a prize of 300 leva (about $175), selected books await the well-deserved second and third places, and the best poems will be published by Scribens in a poetry collection! They will be chosen by a distinguished jury: the poets Petar Chuhov, Boyko Lambovski and Violeta Kuneva, Scribens managing director Georgi Gavrilov, and the creator of Digital Stories, Georgi Karamanev.
14What Kind of “Person” Is AI? A Psychological Experiment
We invite four of the most popular AI models into the psychologist’s office to find out what kind of “personalities” they turn out to have! Domineering or easily swayed, sensitive or pragmatic? What are GPT-5, Claude Opus 4.1, Gemini 2.5 Pro and o3 like by “character”?
15The EdAItor Test: Can Artificial Intelligence Edit a Text?
While we debate whether artificial intelligence will ever write indistinguishably from a human (and it already can!), everything quietly changed. Whether we realize it or not, we now read algorithm-generated texts every day. The latest undeniable proof surfaced on social media a month ago: some of the most respected Bulgarian media outlets uncritically published texts riddled with the telltale sentences that unmistakably show they were written by ChatGPT or its kin, and that were not even read by their “author” before going online. So can't we invite AI to save us… as an editor? Not long ago we tested how some of the most advanced AI models perform as proofreaders, and now it is time to raise the bar. In our next major experiment, we put AI's skills as an editor to the test.
16Can We Tell a Generated Voice from a Human One? The Answer Is Clear
Can you tell a human voice from one generated by algorithms? 2,036 people took part in the Digital Stories experiment looking for the answer to this question, along with many other important nuances. The result, in my view, is unambiguous…
17Child or AI? Could 4,000 People Tell Who Drew It?
The “Child’s Drawing or AI?” experiment drew enormous interest! In a month and a half, almost 4,000 people took the quiz, trying to tell 15 real drawings by children under 11 from images created by artificial intelligence. Time to sum up the results: did we rise to the challenge, were the real or the generated drawings easier to spot, did the children themselves judge better, and why do the conclusions matter?
18(In)human Errors: Can AI Be Your Proofreader?
At a time when fewer and fewer media outlets, and even publishers, trust specialists to watch over spelling, could artificial intelligence (AI) turn out to be a useful assistant? It is time for a telling spelling experiment with some of the most powerful models around. We all (we hope) believe that online we are now judged by our spelling rather than our clothes, and since we communicate more and more through written text, the way we write reveals so much to the other person. Can AI help us write correctly?
19Test: Can You Tell an AI Voice from a Human One?
Six audio clips, each speaking a short phrase. Some were generated by AI, the others are real human voices. Can you tell them apart? Take part by August 15, 2025, and with six correct answers you enter the draw for a modest gift. Will you guess which voice belongs to a person and which to a machine? The gauntlet has been thrown!
20Who's Speaking—a Human or an Algorithm?
It's no news that AI generates images and texts that (we checked!) cannot be told apart from those made by humans. Video still seems to lag behind, but… Can you imagine a voice indistinguishable from a human one reading the news, or calling you on the phone with no chance of you telling the difference—not a cloned voice, but an entirely artificial one, in pure Bulgarian, a language almost impossible for non-native speakers? It's time for a resonant Digital Story, and a challenge awaits you afterward…
