Be Right Back

January 29, 2021 4:48 AM

Microsoft has been granted a patent to use the personal information of deceased people to create a chatbot, allowing users to talk to the dead.
posted by adept256 (27 comments total)

📎 It looks like you're trying to summon Windows 10 Mobile...
posted by adept256 at 4:52 AM on January 29, 2021 [19 favorites]

Monetizing Eliza
posted by chavenet at 5:02 AM on January 29, 2021 [3 favorites]

Black Mirror already showed us why this is probably a bad idea....
posted by Captain_Science at 5:03 AM on January 29, 2021 [15 favorites]

The patent is pretty general; the dystopian "speak to the dead" angle appears to be entirely the Independent's invention. Which is dumb, because there are tons of dumb dystopian angles to this that they don't even touch! For instance: people who can't get over a breakup spinning up a chatbot of an ex. Busy parents having their kids talk to the chatbot. Chatbots synthesized from the data of multiple entities! Y U got to be so booooooring, Independent?
posted by phooky at 5:04 AM on January 29, 2021 [9 favorites]

Unless the chatbot is possessed, surely you are just talking to it, rather than the dead?
posted by lesbiassparrow at 5:04 AM on January 29, 2021

No. No. Also: No.
posted by tommasz at 5:06 AM on January 29, 2021 [4 favorites]

Except it hasn't and they won't be.
posted by GallonOfAlan at 5:07 AM on January 29, 2021

If their experience with chatbots is any indication, you'll find out the dead were nazis.

No. No. Also: No.

That's the part of that Black Mirror episode that always makes me cry.
posted by adept256 at 5:12 AM on January 29, 2021 [5 favorites]

“He slotted some ice, connected the construct, and jacked in. It was exactly the sensation of someone reading over his shoulder. He coughed.
"Dix? McCoy? That you man?"
His throat was tight.
"Hey, bro," said a directionless voice.
"It's Case, man. Remember?"
"Miami, joeboy, quick study."
"What's the last thing you remember before I spoke to you, Dix?"
"Nothin'."
"Hang on."
He disconnected the construct. The presence was gone. He reconnected it.
"Dix? Who am I?"
"You got me hung, Jack. Who the fuck are you?"
"Ca--your buddy. Partner. What's happening, man?"
"Good question."
"Remember me being here, a second ago?"
"No."
"Know how a ROM personality construct works?"
"Sure, bro, it's a firmware construct."
"So I jack it into the bank I'm using, I can give it sequential real-time memory?"
"Guess so," said the construct.
"Okay, Dix,. You are a ROM construct. Got me?"
"If you say so," said the construct. "Who are you?"
"Case."
"Miami," said the voice, "joeboy, quick study.”
― William Gibson, Neuromancer
posted by valkane at 5:15 AM on January 29, 2021 [29 favorites]

> ...there are tons of dumb dystopian angles to this that they don't even touch!

First thing to come to mind for me is stalkers creating chatbots out of the objects of their obsession. Which is horrifying but also makes me wonder whether it could end up a good enough proxy to distract them from pursuing the people they want to stalk, or whether it would deepen their stalking inclinations instead. Even if the former were to happen most of the time, if the latter happens at all it's bad.
posted by at by at 5:39 AM on January 29, 2021 [2 favorites]

I'm not sure how they got this patent given the prior art in the area?
posted by Pyry at 6:01 AM on January 29, 2021 [1 favorite]

I have automated
the deceased
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for eternity

Forgive me
they were PROFIT
so sweet
and so cold
posted by Lanark at 6:15 AM on January 29, 2021 [32 favorites]

This has already been done.
posted by signal at 6:22 AM on January 29, 2021 [3 favorites]

If the singularity ends up being the non-living embodiment of Taylor Swift tweets, I can live with that.
posted by jacquilynne at 6:27 AM on January 29, 2021

This app was also shown during WestWorld season 3.
posted by tdismukes at 6:29 AM on January 29, 2021 [2 favorites]

There Will Come Soft Rains
posted by Young Kullervo at 7:16 AM on January 29, 2021 [2 favorites]

thanks, signal, been trying to find that article (sporadically, and half-heartedly) since that black mirror episode came out. i...don't hate this idea in the abstract; do have some... concerns.
anyway: "doors and corners, kid, that's where they get you."
posted by 20 year lurk at 7:21 AM on January 29, 2021 [3 favorites]

I’m pretty sure this was a Max Headroom episode?
posted by The Underpants Monster at 7:25 AM on January 29, 2021 [1 favorite]

Does that mean Mormons can now get consent?
posted by pseudocode at 8:19 AM on January 29, 2021 [4 favorites]

Huh. I wrote the first 10k words of this science fiction novel a few years ago
posted by potrzebie at 8:47 AM on January 29, 2021 [1 favorite]

Now this is a livestream I'd watch: Turing tests in which someone has to distinguish a bot from their actual spouse.
posted by metaBugs at 8:53 AM on January 29, 2021 [5 favorites]

I’m pretty sure this was a Max Headroom episode?

Had to go find the disturbing video clip.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 9:02 AM on January 29, 2021 [1 favorite]

I prefer using my Ouija board. But they’ll probably have an app where the mouse is the planchette and the computer will speak what’s being pointed at. Oh, are there any issue with computer security contacting the dead? Like maybe infecting heaven or hell with a computer virus, or worse having your computer possessed by a demon? Oh, I forgot that last bit sounds like normal Windows operation...
posted by njohnson23 at 9:07 AM on January 29, 2021

I've been doing that weird emailing a dead person thing lately (best best friend died from COVID on Jan 12th) and I just realized that his adult kids were reading them...so ummm, now I feel like a complete lunatic. I'm going to stick to journaling and call my therapist.
posted by lextex at 9:17 AM on January 29, 2021 [5 favorites]

The basic service will be free, though your loved one will periodically advertise products and services to you, in a facsimile of their own voice. The ad-free service will be $59.95/month, and will only use the data gathered from your conversations to improve your ad targeting elsewhere on the web and in apps.
posted by acb at 10:00 AM on January 29, 2021 [10 favorites]

I’m pretty sure this was a Max Headroom episode?

Not just the episode The Underpants Monster linked above, the whole show is basically premised on that idea - Max Headroom is constructed from a brain dump of star reporter Edison Carter. He's created when Carter is injured and thought to be dying (Max Headroom were the last words Carter saw before he went comatose - it's written on the traffic barrier his head collides with - and this is where the AI construct takes it name from.)
posted by Dysk at 9:04 PM on January 29, 2021 [3 favorites]

The basic service will be free, though your loved one will periodically advertise products and services to you, in a facsimile of their own voice. The ad-free service will be $59.95/month, and will only use the data gathered from your conversations to improve your ad targeting elsewhere on the web and in apps.
posted by acb at 2:00 AM on January 30 [9 favorites −] Favorite added! [!]

Also, as adept256 mentions above, your loved one will become a Nazi, without a supplemental subscription to McAffee NaziGuard (TM), the AI editor that removes all Nazi thoughts from the minds of the deceased.
posted by saysthis at 8:39 PM on January 30, 2021