09/05-11   -   Press releases

What are the most eye-catching, fun or controversial chatbot synonyms? Chatbots.org investigates

Chatbots.org, the leading business and research community in humanlike conversational artificial intelligence, looks into the seven most fun, eye catching or controversial synonyms of avatar, virtual assistant and chatbot.

A chat bot is an intelligent character on a website, in a game or in a smart phone app, which looks like a virtual human. As embodied agents, they are able to hold conversations with verbal and nonverbal cues with their human partners. Their intelligence continues to grow as time goes by.

Following their recent publication of 127 chatbot synonyms, Chatbots.org now looks at the most striking terms, either because they are under dispute by the industry, or due to their fun-factor.

Amongst the most amusing synonyms are the talkative ones, lacking a strong ability to listen. Their skill is to generate words - and not bother too much about their conversational partner!

Chatterbox: A contraction of ´chatter´ and ´box´, especially known through its use in the Chatterbox Challenge, one of the oldest competitions in the area of conversational AI. While the competition is about creating artificial intelligent listeners, the term itself implies it is only about one way dialogues.

Chatterbot: Combining chatter and robot, where conversational AI should be also about textual comprehension, empathy and emotion, this term is actually akin to advertising: a ´sending´ specialist. It has been used a lot in the past, but has become increasingly outdated in modern discussions.

Talking Head: Animated characters or videoed humans, who start their talking upon the opening of a webpage. Many consumers, often annoyed, refer to those characters as ´talking heads´. The usage of the term ´talking heads´ tends to be very informal, but also quite off putting. Some academic researchers use the same term in a formal sense for their research systems with excellent listening abilities; an interesting contradiction.

The Chatbots.org synonym compilation also contains a few synonyms for which there seems to be some dispute as to whether they are true synonyms or not.

Conversational Interface: Computer screens responding to our gestures in the air, sometimes responding to voice, and soon also responding to emotional facial expressions. Strictly speaking, these are a virtual agent without a body. It is very likely that conversational interfaces will evolve into conversational avatars, with no difference at all beyond divergent histories.

Embodied Conversational Interface Agent: An ECIA is an intelligent chatbot with the ability to talk about documents on screen, or about objects in virtual worlds. This allows the user to point at a couch in virtual shop and say, "I like that one, what´s the price?" Not too far from now, every chat bot will have this kind of skill set, making this term a true synonym.

Intelligent User Interface: Much human computer interaction research is focused on gestures, eye direction and body movements, realising a user´s experience of a virtual human on the other side of the screen, just like the user would experience a real human behind glass. Many IUI research is actually focused on conversational AI, working on the future of intelligent virtual agents.

Chatbots.org, advancing humanlike conversational AI worldwide, is initiating the discussion between industry leaders and key research institutions to reduce the almost ever-growing long list of 127 synonyms and help move the exciting chatbot field forward.

To read the entire list, please visit:
http://www.chatbots.org/synonyms/

About Chatbots.org
Chatbots.org is the leading community on humanlike conversation artificial intelligence, such as a chat bot, virtual assistants, virtual humans and avatars. With more than 9,000 members, academics, businesses and individuals, it helps to advance the industry for all involved with virtual humans.

Join the community today by registering at:
http://www.chatbots.org