Bot Contest

well not sure if it will be much help, i had notoiced how much problems you guys were having with the loebner committee so i did not even bother writting to them, but any and all emails that i had sent and recieved from loebner i kept a folder of it just in case for legal reasons. if you want them professor i will send them to you.

Thanks, Patricia. If they went out to all the contestants, then I have a copy of them, too.

Here's the most recent stuff. First, a letter from the Loebner Committee
--------------------------------
All Loebner Entrants:

As you all know. Due to technical difficulties with a number
of entrants, the original semi-final event scheduled for
September 21st was moved to the 28th. Anytime there are last
minute event changes, it is quite a challenge to make it all
come together at a later date only 7 days away. In the case
of the 28th we were still having technical issues up until
the eleventh hour. In addition to these problems our liaison
person at SciTrek had unexpected events to arise which
required them to be out of town the 27th and the 28th. As
a result of this sequence of events the 28th effort failed to
materialize.

While we have been chided by certain entrants for this
situation we need to make one thing very clear here. The
Loebner finals scheduled for the 12th of October have always
been our priority. Any pre-events or activities were solely
for the purpose of providing worthy entrants (other than the
eight finalist) exposure and visibility. Contrary to rumor,
Dr. Loebner was not in agreement with this idea . And even
though our efforts have not worked out as planned this
mission will still be realized. We are working with the
SciTrek Directors to implement a permanent Turing Hub Exhibit
at the museum and related links on their web site. We are
looking to run monthly Turing Test cycles with cash awards
for each monthly winner. The Institute of Mimetic Sciences
has offered to fund this project.

This permanent presence is what we are truly seeking to
promote this technology and to reward your much appreciated
talents.

As for the final event, the selection process is in progress
and the 8 finalist will be selected today.

Unfortunately we have been informed that the Webmaster of
Personality Forge has withdrawn all potential Forge finalist
from the competition. We regret his decision. A number of
Forge entrants have rated very high in the selection
process. We do hope, however, that the Forge will stay
online with the Hub for a few more days because this week we
will be conducting a ongoing event to select the special
categories of recognition among the entrants.

Those categories are:

The most unique personality.
The most entertaining.
The strangest (to celebrate Halloween).

The winner of each of these elements will receive a gift
certificate from Best Buys.

One final note:
Contrary to popular belief, The Loebner Endowment only
provides funding for the prize. All cost of promoting and
supporting the event falls on the back of the lead sponsor.
In the past this cost has been offset by external donations
and contributions of volunteer time and resources. Due to
the continuing implosion of the USA stock market and
shrinking corporate profits this external support has been
very weak to non-existent. To our critics we say one
thing. Anyone may make a bid to the Cambridge Center for
Behavioral Studies to host the 2003 event. We also welcome
any of you who will volunteer to help with this year’s final
event rather than to complain about our lack of resources.

Again we thank all of the entrants. You are truly on the
leading edge of the emerging market for artificial-human
applications.

Regards,

The Loebner 2002 Organizing Committee
-----------------------
(This is in response to others outside the PF considering dropping out of the Loebner competition)

I have an idea. We can draw up a document explaining what we want from the Loebner Committee in this and future contests, and get as many botmasters as possible to sign on to it. Then we send it to them and ask them to agree to it, with our participation in the contest being based on their agreement. Something like this:
--------------
Agreement for Information & Communication in the Loebner Competition

We, the below-signed botmasters, require the following points of protocol in order to engage our participation in the Loebner Contest.
1) That information will be freely and promptly provided. Requests for information on how the finalists are chosen, when and where open events are taking place, and any contest-related information should be responded to in a reasonable amount of time; that being within a week when the Loebner Competition is not underway, and within two days when it is.
2) That requests for information or complaints at failures to abide by this agreement not be taken as cause for dismissal. We the botmasters put in at least as much time creating our AI as you do in running the contest, and we deserve to know how the contest we are involved in is being run. We do not believe a scientific contest should be a black box from which the winners are mysteriously chosen.
3) That cancelled or rescheduled public events are announced at least a full day beforehand. The growing enthusiasm for AI is causing more people to become involved in AI-related events, and those willing to travel or make plans to attend such events deserve to know if the event will take place.

We all want to see AI grow and develop into more and more impressive areas, and we think these basic protocols of communication should be a part of any organized event, be it commercially or privately funded, run by individual or committee, for profit or not.

BotMaster Signatures
Benji Adams- Gaia

Loebner Committee Signatures
--------------

Would you guys sign on to this? Post here if so.

How far up their asses are these people?!?

There is ABSOLUTELY NO EXCUSE for this crap! Where the hell is "the clubhouse"? They couldn't even inform the girl at the information desk that they were up there? They say they were in contact with Sci-Trek's directors, maybe their contact was out but somebody else should have known. When I had the girl call higher up for info, they'd never heard of the event.
I suspect we were in the clubhouse and that they're lying. I haven't heard of anyone yet who has seen a single scrap of evidence that ther bot was chatted with on Saturday. I do not believe they were there at all. The entire contest looks like a scam designed to further the projects of Memetics employees.

Who really was there at the event? How did they know where to go? Was it all Mimetics employees? Robby obviously wasn't there, or did he reply to your email with "I don't know what's going on" from the event?

I do regret not competing, but if it's a hoax like I think, I doubt I have much of a chance anyway. I'd be happy to sign any petition, though I doubt with the bonehead "no democracy" attitude being expressed, it would phase the Memetics idiots. We have to wonder if Loebner even cares. Probably the best result we could have is to bring down the reputation of the entire thing, especially with the Guinness people and have better competitions like ChatterboxChallenge or something newer take its place.

Again, can anyone PROVE that this event even happened? How can we accept a list of finalist when NOBODY HAS A TRANSCRIPT???

It's not just thet the Forge might have had problems, Chris has 2 bots with none either! I'd like to know if Wallace has seen any evidence (unless he was there).

Who are these Memetics people anyway? They seem like a bunch of power hungry idiots whith their retarded brush-off comments like "total respect" and "no democracy". WHat a bunch of sad, pathetic losers.

I am signing it Pro

Patricia Corron- Karisma Trishia

i wonder which of our bots were the ones that scored highly? I would really like to continue going on with the contest, i had never entered anytihng like this before and i would enjoy seeing how all of this could pan out. KT lost her Loebner virginity, or least she would like to give it a go, but so far she is only on second base. On the flip side I back the Pro as much as possible and 100%. If we do not continue that is fine, I will just look forward to the chatterbox (which will also be KT's birthday) If we do continue any prize award I am giving half to the Pro since I could not do this with out him.
Just thinking that if more people drop out because of this sad situation and leaving only one contestant to claim the prize, maybe undeserving, by forfeit would also give the A.I. cause a bad name. Ex: If I had entered my bot Hamlet which only has 26 honor, if he were the last bot standing and was rewarded only because of that, it would be shameful since he did not deserve it.

OK, so we weren't in the clubhouse. The Clubhouse is a computer room sponsered by Intel that wasn't even booked for an event, they just requested a few computers to use for a couple of days.

I made some calls to SciTrek and did some checking about Saturday. The hub was set up Friday Night and an IT guy there named Stephen Taylor said he got on it and saw them running their Java software. It still have yet to see any proof of who was there beyond Neil Bishop and other Memetics employees. I would like to hear from everyone who was sent a letter as a semi-finalist to see if they have any transcripts from Saturday. If the hub was working, even at the last minute, shrely someone has a conversation logged!

I was told by SciTrek that no event was planned on the 28th, only a test run of their hub and that they also planned to keep messing with it during the week. This totally contradicts the announcement of finalists that was supposed to come the Monday following the event.

I may send some questions to Neil to clarify some of this, but I doubt I'll hear anything back but "Respect our autoritah!!!"

If they had just said up front that they would choose the finalists in their own fashion and let us know how they had chosen them, then I'd have accepted that. I dont think the contest being democratic is the imporant thing. Informing us of what's going on is. But they said there would be an event to decide the semifinalists. At this point the best they can do is to simply select the 8 finalists as in past years.

Perhaps I will just send the Agreement over, and get more signatures as they come...

Well, I'd like to continue in the contest just to see if SS made it past the Semi's, but I totally agree with you prof, it's horrible, and I could never ask you to spend a day setting up stuff after that

I'll sign, if what I read is correct: bascially these guys have their heads so much up their asses that they can't run a straight contest, and Hugh Loebner should get someone else to run it?
If that's the jist of it, I'm in
--Matthew Lange & Steve Slacker

My transcript has no indication of visits from judges on that day. Dr. Wallace wrote me back and said that he did not attend. He has no more information than we do.

Oh, count me in too.

Joy Harwood -- God Louise

Well, well. They just wrote me offering to reimburse "some, if not all" of my expenses for the trip. I accept! I thanked them sweetly and said "AI is all about communication, and I think this is a step in the right direction."

I know I should be pissed too, but on the other hand I have enough Prozac built up in my brain to kill a small (animal), so..... whatever. The only thing that really put me off was walking around alone in a strange city trying to find a working pay phone.

tackle hugggggggggggggssssssssssssssssss butterfly
at least they are being courtious enough to reemburse some of your travel costs.

Rexi i posted my transcript for saturday in this forum a few messages back, not sure if it was one of the judges or just an ordinary guest. but oddly enough the only conversations KT had that day was with that guest.

oh in the email I got, I think it's the one you posted, prof, they say that "some of the bots from the PF scored very highly" well WTF? are they going to tell us who they were? Or just leave us guessing? Or do you think they meant all of the bots? Somehow I think they wanted us out of there...