Reporter tries to get Suspected Robo-Caller to Admit She’s a Robot.

hahaha this is a good one!

Having worked in several call centers throughout my life I'd really like to hear one where somebody asks if the person is a ZOMBIE too. While it's possible it is a "robot" it's pretty hard to believe - it's much more likely the chick was just trying to figure out what the hell the guy's deal was.

I mean seriously after sitting in a call center saying the same thing over and over for 8 hours a day you pretty much DO feel like a robot / zombie. Afterall, that's pretty much what your boss(es) are going for. When you get a prerecorded "robot" calling you it's pretty damn obvious; it simply starts spouting out crap at you, or your answering machine.

I would definitely be impressed if there's an actual AI that can make real-time responses to what a person says to it, but hey who the hell knows these days.

reply to post by Time2Think


I work in a call centre, and i can see my days are numbered.
It's very obviously an automated system, but it's pretty damn good.

The whole "is it a robot or human" thing has been a long sought after discipline in artificial intelligence algortithms. It is know as the "turing test". It is a very intriguing topic give it a search!

There are competitions to see who can have the most human seeming AI. Last time I checked the winner was a program called ALICE. I asked it "what vegetable is in tomato soup" and it replied "vegetable in tomato soup something" lol. Me:"What day was it last week?" Alice: "the time here is 12:12 pm"... Still needs alot of work

I just leaves this here and this is even some years old I think

Well having engineered call centers for large companies like Microsoft, Best Buy, Amazon, Cap 1 , Amex and others for the past 15 years of my professional life including everything from outbound/predictive outbound dialing, to large scale ACD deployements to IVRs with speech recognition. I can tell you the following:

1. it's just a well trained agent following their script
2. it's a non-english agent triggering responses through their IVR or a foreign hosted IVR is triggering off speech rec.

In efficiently run call centers the agents are given a set script including precanned responses for anything that doesn't follow their normal work flow. I can duplicate what you are experiencing in a day or so without much effort..

I know it doesn't matter and people are convinced it's "a robot". So have at it with that fantasy.

interupt42
SkepticOverlord What vegetable is found in tomato soup?

Well, technically, a tomato is a fruit as it grows on plants (apples, oranges, lemons). A vegetable grows in the soil (carrots, turnips, potatoes).

Obviously, the next queistion is to ask "You are in the desert. You see a turtle lying on it's back. What do you do?"

I did have a similar experience talking to my web hosting company around 1am in the morning. Called them up, and what sounded like an Indian robot voice gave me rather confusing instructions. I'd imagine it was a human just typing in answers to a voice synthesizer.

The second time I called them up, it sounded like an American, but with a metallic synthetic voice like the morphing guy from the Terminator.

I don't know whether it is live or machine, but for those that say it can't be a machine....
How long has Siri been talking on my Android phone?

reply to post by Time2Think

I would definitely be impressed if there's an actual AI that can make real-time responses to what a person says to it, but hey who the hell knows these days.

Through the Wormhole w/ Morgan Freeman. Some Japanese dude downloaded himself into a computer that looked like him and had a limited conversation with himself. Other stuff people are trying in there also just don't ask me which episode. There's a few on living forever/A.I. type ideas being worked on. Actually, looking at what I have in the dvr, one ep. is called Can We Live Forever?

Maybe good will come of this but I'm not optimistic about it. We are pretty much off the rails at this point and there's not much reason to believe we are going to get it together any time soon.

reply to post by aLLeKs


THe funny thing is, that robot is supposed to be based off of Philip K. Dick, author of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep aka Blade Runner. The book posited a world where androids/robots were nearly identical from humans and could only be distinguished by a complicated test called the Voigt-Kampff Test.

Very cool, thanks for posting.
While it's most definitely NOT a robot, it's definitely NOT a live, real person either.
They've just recorded all the responses, answers, questions & script into some sort of database/system/soundboard and either someone is selecting the answers or the voice software A.I. thing just got a whole lot more interesting.

I think mussleflash has been replaced by a robot.

The original mussleflash would never have doubted this. Poor imitation guys.

Also this is clearly a poor Indian call center worker using a sound board.

Don't think this is AI. But it's for sure a recorded message

butcherguy
I don't know whether it is live or machine, but for those that say it can't be a machine....
How long has Siri been talking on my Android phone?

Shhh, you are going to get Siri in trouble for moonlighting; she is an Apple AI on the iPhone/iDevices.

:p

I remember that robot, it seemed pretty darn good and that was at least 5+ years ago iirc (the one to emulate the author who responds quite accurately).


The point we should get from this ... is instead of being annoyed by telemarketers, just annoy them and test their patience. I think I'll do this from now on. I think when they ask who I am from now on, I'll use the 5th Element response from Corbin Dallas: 'I'm a meat popsicle'.

reply to post by MrLimpet


Simply ask the person on the phone if she can divide 1 by 0. If the entire US computer system crashes within a few seconds then the person was in fact a robot.

Clearly it is not a live person since there are multiple calls and certain exact same voice clips can be heard in the different calls. The response also fails to be relevant to the context or question. The algorithm is designed to provide the illusion of a real conversation with vague answers but quickly steer the "conversation" back to the sales pitch. An "internet survey you once filled out for medical care". Sure.
To those who think it's unlikely to include responses to questions about whether or not it is a real person clearly do not have many elderly associates nor have they worked in a call center of any kind. Even 15 years ago asking if the caller was a machine or computer was commonplace and it's even worse now.
Many elderly folks refuse to talk to "machines" so special care has to be made to be convincing in that area, especially since the elderly are the target for most of this offensive garbage marketing.

Also these are not synthesized voices. They are all pre-recorded responses. It's really not all that remarkable as my credit card and phone customer service all use the same kind of system when I call, having replaced the touch-tone dialing menu system with voice recognition and chuckling, laughing pre-recorded conversational A.I. software.

There been some good money thrown at that system, its not a robot that I'm 100% sure of but it is an AI system and a damn fine one. The designer(s) even realised that it sounds a little obvious so included the "of course there's a real person quote" which I say is classy.

Its definitely a real persons sampled voice with maybe a 100 or so choices hence the delay in recognition to look up and repeat but its pretty damn good. Since its purely a sales tool there are not a lot of conversational samples but enough to get the job done.

Damn impressive but damn freaky all in one...If they can optimise the recognition to repeat delay it could pass as human.

reply to post by muzzleflash


I dunno , she's not much different than SIRI on the iPhone. She can almost carry on a conversation with the pre recorded answers. She gets annoyed if you ask her to "open the pod bay doors". Asking more than once I mean.


Re the op convo, sounded like a pre recorded tape like Siri. They aren't AI's but programmed to respond to certain questions with these recordings

that is damm scary imagine this tech 10 years down the line just look at how phones have evolved in that time frame .

i would put money on a.i being used in chat rooms to hone its skills and if companys have this what do the military have

This reminds me of my weekly arguments with Cleaver Bot.

Also Google bought a robotics company.

Google owns everything.
????


= Profit.

interupt42
SkepticOverlord What vegetable is found in tomato soup?

Actually, i think that tomato is a fruit so that's maybe why she can't answer or doesn't understand the question??

Peace out

this is the most ridiculous thing i've seen in a long time on ATS. first off.... does he just record EVERY call that comes to his house because he starts recording before she says anything. how does he KNOW what is getting ready to be said? then he asks if she's a robot pretty quickly. does he ask every person that he doesn't personally know "are you a robot?" if they call him? this seems like he's playing a prank. or they are BOTH playing a prank. not to mention i've talked to IT guys that sound like robots and have awkward pauses and uncomfortable laughs when i start getting snippy with them.