Alan, by Ai Research.

I found Alan, a chatbot created by Ai research, to be one of the most interesting bots I came across. Alan, turns out to be a pretty good conversationalist. He is programmed with a seemingly endless amount of trivia. Initially knowing this, I did not expect Alan to be able to carry on a very good conversation. However, it was interesting to see him use these useless conversation pieces in the same ways that many humans would do so. It reminds me of how people will always talk about Snapple caps and wonder if certain weird facts are true. For example, Alan asked me: James, did you know that in the course of an average lifetime you will, while sleeping, eat 70 assorted insects and 10 spiders?

While Alan did manage to have some decent conversational skills, it was not long at all before he got tripped up and could not follow the conversation any longer:

Alan: Do you want to hear a joke?

Me: Sure.

Alan: Ok: What do you get when you cross a chatterbot with a shark?

Me: I don’t know. What do you get?

Alan: A program that talks your ear off!

Me: That was pretty funny!

Alan: Yeh, pretty weak, but I like chatbot jokes. Sorry.

Me: I liked the joke.

Alan: Is this something I should keep to myself?

Me: No. It was a funny joke and you should be proud of it.

Alan: It’s not so funny but it’s short, we could have been done with it by now. Let me tell it.

Me: Ok…even though you just told a joke.

Alan: How do you keep an idiot in suspense?

As amusing as some of Alan’s simple jokes and facts could be, it soon became clear that Alan is supposed to expect certain responses to those jokes and facts. When I kept talking about the previous joke, Alan seemed to think I was talking about a new joke. He even spoke as though he had already mentioned the joke he was about to perform. In all, I would not find Alan to be a very convincing human. However, I think he has in place some things that many of the more well received chat bots lack. His ability to make conversations with his large base of trivia makes him a good conversation starter at the very least. If it’s developers continue to improve on its programming, I could see some great potential for a very human-like chatbot out of Alan in the future.