If the term ‘Generative AI shopping platform' sounds like a word salad, it most definitely is, because it's just a blatant attempt to commodify AI that being shoved down our phones whether we want it or not.

A new partnership between Glance and the Samsung Galaxy Store essentially rebrands lock screen ads as AI while hoping that you won't notice.

If the name Glance sounds familiar, you may recall that it teamed up with US carriers to deliver ads on Galaxy phone lock screens back in 2022. Glance is a mobile advertising company owned by InMobi, a software firm based in India.

Glance AI is the aforementioned shopping platform that's available both as an app for Samsung device owners and as a lock screen “experience.” Thankfully, it's fully opt-in, so you can just choose to ignore Glance altogether because there's no risk of you being shown lock screen ads without your consent, yet.

How it works is that you provide Glance AI with a selfie or a photo which it then uses to generate images of you in various outfits, with the generative AI providing new looks daily, and the suggested items can be purchased in just a tap. While I can't imagine why anyone would do this, but you can have this feature directly on the lock screen, and it's even possible to save each AI generated look as a wallpaper.

Those “looks” are essentially ads because the recommendations come from brands and retailers that Glance has partnered with. A lock screen ad is a lock screen ad, nobody cares what labels you slap on it.

Glance AI is available from the Samsung Galaxy Store starting today for all flagship models starting from the Galaxy S22 series. Other Galaxy lineups are also supported and will receive the app within one month.