Why AI And Chatbots Need Personality

Even though Siri and Alexa are chatbots that many people now believe they can't live without, it was the SmarterChild chatbot that lived on many people's buddy lists in 2000, and that gave humans their first widespread exposure to chatbots. The thing that SmarterChild, Siri and Alexa have, along with other successful chatbots (computer programs designed to mimic human conversation), is personality. Robert Hoffer, the creator of SmarterChild, explained their goal was to create a bot people would actually use and to achieve that objective, "we had to make the best friend on the Internet." They succeeded in creating a bot who could respond with funny, sad, and sarcastic comments--ultimately more human-like than a robot. And, back in 2000, it spoke to 250,000 humans each day, which was extraordinary for the time, so there's no debate that it was used!