Robot Chat!

[Snake]

Welp, we got a cool HP photo printer for Christmas last year and are now trying to use it. Come to find out it only prints in red and yellow. It might actually be the ink cartridge, but anyway...

So after a bunch of screwing around that lead to nowhere, I tried to do a live chat at HP with a lovely woman named Abigail.

Here's a bit of the "live" chat:

I've cut most of it out...

Thomas Provencher : Brand new printer, just opened out of box tonight, prints photos in red-scale. Don't know what to do and there is NO explaination in the printed/digital/online documentation.
[An agent will be with you shortly.]
[You are now chatting with Abigail .]
Thomas Provencher : Hello, Abigail
Abigail : Welcome to HP Total Care Chat Support for Imaging & Printing Group. My name is Abigail. Please give me a minute while I review your problem description details.
Abigail : Hello!!!
Thomas Provencher :
Abigail : As I was reviewing your details, I came to know that you are using HP Photosmart a526 compact printer and operating system as windows xp and the issue that we are facing is that you are getting the photos in the red color4. Am I Correct?
Thomas Provencher : Yes.

blah blah blah, 60 minutes pass...

Abigail : Thomas, please let me know if you are able to align the cartridges
Thomas Provencher : okay\
Thomas Provencher : It's starting now
Abigail : Have to done it ?
Abigail : okay.\
Thomas Provencher : sorry for the pause, I had to get more paper
Abigail : Okay.
Thomas Provencher : Failed.
Abigail : Is it comming as the error ?

blah blah, etc...

Thomas Provencher : You must be working with an automated responce type thing, eh?
Thomas Provencher : You're quite robotic
Abigail : I am a person like you.

etc, etc...

Thomas Provencher : I've already done that and nothing changes
Abigail : Okay.
Thomas Provencher : There was no test page at the end of the cleaning
Abigail : Then let us do it manually.
Abigail : Please take out the cartridges from from the printer.
Thomas Provencher : just three pages of numbers and what have you
Abigail : And clean the copper contacts with the lint free cloth and the distilled water.
Abigail : Please do it very carefully.
Thomas Provencher : the contacts that go in the back or where it prints or both?
Abigail : no.
Abigail : Please let me know the date of expiry of the cartridges from the cartridges itself.
Thomas Provencher : but you didn't answer my question...
Thomas Provencher : sep 22, 2010, I think?
Abigail : Please let me know the question that you want me to answer ?
Thomas Provencher : cleen the contacts that go in the back or where it prints or both?
Thomas Provencher : *clean
Abigail : Now, please replace the cartridges in the printer and try to print the test page again.
Thomas Provencher : Hello, Abigail
Abigail : Yes.
Abigail : Please let me know if we have the test page printed ?
Thomas Provencher : not yet
Abigail : Please let me know as soon as we are done with it ?
Thomas Provencher : printing now
Abigail : Okay.
Thomas Provencher : test page done
Abigail : okay.
Abigail : Please let me know the quality of the test page ?
Thomas Provencher : It's just a bunch of text... what do you need to know?
Abigail : I would like to kn wif you are happy with the print quality ?
Abigail : **know
Thomas Provencher : Listen, it's not the print quality...
Thomas Provencher : it's the fact that it fails to align...
Thomas Provencher : and that it only prints red and yellow
Abigail : Thomas, thanks for the information
Thomas Provencher : Hopefully you can do something with it
Abigail : Please let me know if you tried to print the alignement page again ?
Thomas Provencher : no. I want results, not wasted paper\
Abigail : and you got the error that says failed alignement.
Abigail : We are only closing on the issue that we are facing right now, and trying to resolve it.
Thomas Provencher : What?
Thomas Provencher : It fails alignment EVERY time
Abigail : Okay.
Thomas Provencher : Printing a test page and then trying to align isn't going to do ANYTHING
Thomas Provencher : brb
Abigail : In that case I am sorry to inform you that the printer is facing the issue with the hardware and we will check the warranty statues from our side and in case it is under warranty we will get it replaced.
Thomas Provencher : that sounds terrific
Abigail : Please be online it will take 3 minutes.
Thomas Provencher : tell HP to loosen up a bit and include an ink cartridge that lasts more than 10 photos and give me more than 3 photo papers.
Thomas Provencher : I've waisted them all already, way before talking to Dr. Robotic
Abigail : Thanks for staying online!!
Thomas Provencher : Tell them they are cheap while you're at it... and there robot chat sucks.
Abigail : I am sorry to inform you that from our records the printer is showing out of the warranty.
Thomas Provencher : So they won't send me a new one?
Abigail : Please let me know the date of purchese ?
Thomas Provencher : It was a gift last Christmas.
Abigail : In that case the printer is out of warranty, and I am sorry I will not be able to help you out.
Thomas Provencher : Print another test page?
Abigail : You can try to print the test page.
Thomas Provencher : okay
Abigail : Please let me know the results of the test page ?
Thomas Provencher : done
Thomas Provencher : printed a bunch of numbers
Abigail : Okay.
Thomas Provencher : it says, "Failure NOT due to s"
Thomas Provencher : What does that mean?
Abigail : Please wait I will check it.
Thomas Provencher : okay
Thomas Provencher : I will check the AGS forums in the meantime
Abigail : Okay.
Thomas Provencher : Have you played Awakener yet?
Thomas Provencher : Does it not compute?
Abigail : Please trust me I am trying hard to get it resolved.
Abigail : Please let me know if you are using the cartridges that came with the printer ?
Thomas Provencher : I'm using the ones that came packaged with Xii Game's, Resonance, yes.
Abigail : Okay.
Thomas Provencher : lol
Abigail : Please connect the printer to the computer and we will try tomprint the test page from the printer itself.
Thomas Provencher : If we are printing from the printer itself, then why do I need to connect it to the computer?
Abigail : Okay.
Abigail : Plese let me know if you have the memory card in the printer ?
Thomas Provencher : I don't see a memory card here!
Abigail : Then please let me know how can you print bthe photo ?
Abigail : Then please connect the printer to the computer and try to print the photo and let me know if it prints ?
Thomas Provencher : I can't do that with my bare hands!
Abigail : Please connect it to the computer and try to print the test page so that we can check if it is working ?
Thomas Provencher : You rub your hands up and down your clothes

It doesn't respond after that.

Thomas Provencher : I like how HP took the time to actually make sure that you robots make spelling errors... and even FIX them!
Thomas Provencher : But yet they can't be bothered to give you more than 3 photo paper sheets.
Thomas Provencher : Ah, I get it.
Thomas Provencher : Conspiracy.
Thomas Provencher : It's not about the paper...
Thomas Provencher : It's about their new cool robot chat system.
Thomas Provencher : What do you think, Abby?

Hardily hoodily hoo!1

[ThreeOhFour]

Bahaha

I love the fact that Abigail says "I am a person like you".

I would totally have typed "...actually, Abigail, I am a bot."

"The primary function of the initiative was to reduce growing concerns about the state of unrest in Philadelphia."

"Studies have shown that successful policies were mainly those adopted in a post-conflict environment."

"Upon seeing the response to her elaboration she refused to comment further."

[Andail]

For being a bot, she was a lot more helpful than many real support people I've chatted with

[Leon]

Reminds me of Chatroom....   

[Mr Jake]

Sounds a lot  less than a bot and a lot more like someone with not very great English.

[Snake]

Sounds a lot  less than a bot and a lot more like someone with not very great English.

*Buzzer sounds

That's what I thought at first, since that's how it is now days anyway. You've got someone trying to help you over the phone, but yet, niether person can understand what the hell the other is saying. It's rediculous. That's why I prefered to stay with the live chat when I was given the option of talking on the phone.

Anyway, if she was a real person, she wouldn't have said:

Thanks for staying online!!

after I just insulted her and the company she works for.

Another example is that when I told her that the ink cartridges that I am using came packaged with Xii Game's, Resonance, she says, "okay". Now, being a real tech support chatster dude, you'd know your shit and that something wasn't right with that responce and you'd probably respond with something like, "What do you mean? Where did you get them?" rather than, "Okay."

Besides, half way through the "conversation" with "her", I remember seeing the hours that these tech support people work: 9am-8pm. I started talking to "her" at 8:01pm. That must be when HP turns the robot chat on. I'll have to try again sometime within the hours specified to see if I get a real person or not.

Ah, well. I just wanted to share with you guys. I thought it was quite humorous after realizing what I was talking to. At first it was frustrating. This chat lasted at least an hour and a half. She kept putting me through these endless loops where I was doing things that I've tried already numorus times, getting zero results.

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

I don't know.  If she had poor English skills she might not have understood you and just chose to move on rather than reveal any ignorance on her part.  I would find it very strange indeed for a massive company like Hewlett Packard to use an AI chat system with such horrible control over the language; if anything it would be TOO perfect.

[Snarky]

I don't know. Ignoring insults could just be the operator, you know, staying professional. And the "OK, start from square one" repetitiveness and ultimate non-response could be her finally getting fed up with you. Typos are probably a very effective way of making bots seem more human, so if that's what it was it could very well have been deliberate.

I'd be surprised if HP had the AI to really comprehend and handle a freeform tech-support conversation. I would be more inclined to believe that it was an operator overseeing a highly automated system. e.g. choosing from a list of pre-scripted responses, and sometimes running macros to handle the next three or four interactions. I'm sure each operator is running a couple of dozen chats at the same time.

Even if it was a bot, it was probably being monitored by a person, who might sometimes be stepping in and taking over the conversation.

Googling didn't seem to turn up anything saying that HP is using chat bots for its customer support, except for this other example of a suspicious conversation.

[Clarvalon]

I'd be very surprised if that was a bot.  If so, it would stand a reasonable chance of passing the Turing Test.

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

While fooling a person into thinking a bot is human by myriad typing mistakes might be amusing, poor sentence structure is not an effective way of maintaining a conversation -- especially when clarity is important.  In a customer support situation it would make more sense for the bot to be as clear and concise as possible rather than riddled with potentially misunderstood mistakes that could completely throw off some non-native English readers. 

But if some company would rather you thought you were talking to a human with a really frail clutch on English than actually produce something you can understand and that can help you, I guess that's their prerogative!

[veryweirdguy]

The real test of botness: try to cyber with them.

I'm not sure what the results would mean if they went for it or not! But it would be hot.

[Snarky]

But if some company would rather you thought you were talking to a human with a really frail clutch on English than actually produce something you can understand and that can help you, I guess that's their prerogative!

It doesn't seem all that bad to me. There are some trivial, non-confusing typos and misspellings ("alignement", "statues" instead of "statutes", etc.), and a general lack of punctuation that does make it a bit more difficult to read. That's very typical of the informal style of text chat, though. Other than that, what's the problem? Misplaced articles ("out of the warranty")?

The most egregious error in this whole transcript was Snake's use of "there" instead of "their". 

In general, making a bot not quite proficient in English could make users more tolerant of misunderstandings that would occur anyway, and hence would provide an overall less frustrating experience. (There's some really interesting research on the HCI of AI-human interactions, and how people's expectations are influenced by how the machine presents itself. That's actually part of the reason why the Windows Search Assistant is a puppy by default: dogs are stupid and overeager, so Microsoft thought people might be more forgiving of a puppy than of a human avatar. This also shows how tricky it is to apply some of these findings and get it right.)

[TerranRich]

So HP is hoarding this great AI technology to themselves and purposefully annoying its customers, and we haven't read or heard about it? Sure, I'll believe it.

The lady had a poor grasp of English. That's it. No AI system is that good that hasn't been in some top-notch science demonstration or competition.