We propose the Detailed Outline Control (DOC) framework for improving long-range plot coherence when automatically generating several-thousand-word-long stories. DOC consists of two complementary components: a detailed outliner and a detailed controller. The detailed outliner creates a more detailed, hierarchically structured outline, shifting creative burden from the main drafting procedure to the planning stage. The detailed controller ensures the more detailed outline is still respected during generation by controlling story passages to align with outline details. In human evaluations of automatically generated stories, DOC substantially outperforms a strong Re3 baseline (Yang et al., 2022) on plot coherence (22.5% absolute gain), outline relevance (28.2%), and interestingness (20.7%). Humans also judged DOC to be much more controllable in an interactive generation setting.

Before refined robots such as ASIMO and C-3PO inspired the world, there was Eric -- the first "almost perfect man." The robot was relegated to the dustbin of history after touring Europe and the U.S. in the 1920s. But now, after stumbling upon the original plans for Eric, the Science Museum in London has launched a Kickstarter campaign to bring this man of steel back to life. As of Wednesday, the museum was still short of its more than 50,000 goal. But the hope, the museum said, is to have a robot replica ready in October so they can display him at a new "Robots" exhibition next February and send him off to travel the world like his predecessor. Related: Google's'Next Generation' Atlas Robot Turns Heads "As the U.K.'s first robot, Eric holds a unique place in our history," lead curator Ben Russell said in a statement.