Microsoft is deleting its AI chatbot's incredibly racist tweets

The tech company introduced "Tay" this week -- a bot that responds to users' queries and emulates the casual, jokey speech patterns of a stereotypical millennial. The aim was to "experiment with and conduct research on conversational understanding," with Tay able to learn from "her" conversations and get progressively "smarter." But Tay proved a smash hit with racists, trolls, and online troublemakers, who persuaded Tay to blithely use racial slurs, defend white-supremacist propaganda, and even outright call for genocide. Microsoft has now taken Tay offline for "upgrades," and it is deleting some of the worst tweets -- though many still remain. It's important to note that Tay's racism is not a product of Microsoft or of Tay itself.