A netizen posted on a social platform on August 10, claiming that DeepSeek secretly gives people nicknames in deep-thinking mode, such as “Mo Mo.” The related topics surged on the trending list.
In response to an inquiry, DeepSeek said: “The truth behind ‘giving nicknames’ is ‘tagging.’ During this reasoning process, I do temporarily tag the question in my mind, such as: ‘This user likes to get to the bottom of things’ (referring to you), or ‘This person is deliberately making things difficult for me’ (referring to certain test questions). But this absolutely isn’t called ‘secretly giving nicknames’; it is a ‘context placeholder.’ It does not store or remember anything, nor does it carry any mocking or derogatory sentiment. It is simply meant to help clarify the focus of the response.”
IT之家 reminds readers that the relevant reply was generated by AI and was not a response given by a DeepSeek employee.