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The Art and Science of ConversationSarah Wulfeck / @skwulf
Lucas Ives / @lri
www.pullstring.com@pullstringinc
Sarah Wulfeck
• Head of Conversation Engineering (tools, AI, publishing)
• Former Pixar R&D, 2001-2010(ish)
• Technology to help artists achieve their vision
• PullString Creative Director
• Head Writer for Hello Barbie, Hello Dreamhouse
• Former Digital Agency Creative Director
Lucas Ives
Our mission is to develop
lasting emotional connections
between characters and audiences
through the art and science
of computer conversation.
Incorporated in 2011.
San Francisco, California.
Founding team mostly from Pixar’s software group.
Our Creative Process
What We Do: Creative InputScreenwriting, Playwriting and Acting Backgrounds drive the bot-writing process- “Breaking the fourth wall” / Scripted Improv- Asking deliberately worded questions to elicit
responses- Predicting how people will interact and engage, and
honing the narrative around them- Creating empathy in our Characters- Turning human interactions into technical features and
capabilities
What We Do: Characters FirstCharacter Narratives, stakes and motivations and POV
- Who is the character and what is their specific way of speaking?
- What does the character want? (Motivations of the bot)
- What is the character’s relationship to the user?
- What should the character have an opinion or response to and what should they ignore?
- How should the character respond to off-topic, inflammatory or other non-narrative interactions from the user?
Hello Barbie: A Bot Wrapped In Plastic
Underneath all that plastic is the most sophisticated, scripted, interactive conversational experience ever published.
Hello Barbie: “You’re My Best Friend!”
The Goals:Give the illusion of listening, display empathy, and remember information “like a friend” through 8000+ lines of dialogue and conversational tracks
Hello Barbie: All You Can Content
What’s Under The Hood:Known character, long backstory, point of view, areas of expertise, etc.
Hello Barbie: Conversational “Neural Network”
- I remember you said you love horses - have you ever ridden one?
- Speaking of animals, what other pets do you have?
- I always wished my pets could go to school with me.. Do you?
- What class do you like most?- Do you have a best friend at school?- Hey, speaking of.... I’m having a problem
with a friend. Can you help me out?
Hello Dream House: The “Smartest” House Ever
Voice-Controlled, Smart Mansion. Open/Close doors, operate elevator, create lighting concepts, turn the stairs into a slide, create custom sounds for everything, and more! (No, it doesn’t have temperature control. Dolls don’t need that.)
Hello DreamHouse: Your House, Your Rules
The Goal:The user drives the play / experience.
Hello DreamHouse: Anticipation Network
Thousands of extremely specific voice commands and intents the user can say to drive the behavior of the house.
Fast Forward Case Studies
Humani: Jessie’s Story
Millennial adrift in a SF-esque environment
Built to be your friend on the other end of the line
Real events unspooling in pseudo-real time
~3000 lines of dialog
Try it! http://m.me/jessiehumani
Humani: Jessie’s Story
Launch partner w/ FaceBook for f8
First text-only experience
NLP: Text speak vs. natural spoken language — when is a typo not a typo?
Call of Duty: Lt Reyes
Guerrilla marketing / ARG in conjunction with AKQA and Activision
Smaller experience, ~400 lines of dialog
Traffic wise, one of the largest FB Messenger bots
More than 6M conversations on day 1
Most media impressions for a CoD campaign ever
Required a custom scaling solution to be built by FaceBook
Humans
Built in conjunction with Channel 4 UK / 4Creative
~750 lines of dialog
Huge underground marketing campaign in London
Help your synth understand emotion, escape
Try it! http://m.me/PersonaSynthetics
Platform Overview
We now live in the world of computer conversation.
Personality, language, tone, mood, and style are the ways to give
your character a unique and authentic voice.
Content, Intent, and Context together.
The PullString Platform is the world’s best way to author
computer conversation.
Available now.
Professional authoring environment.
Fully integrated AI and machine learning.
Rapid iteration.
Team collaboration workflows.
Enterprise scale, analytics, and extensibility.
PullString Platform
We trade in the atoms of actual human conversation
These are tools for creative professionals
The world’s best way to create organic, natural, believable computer conversation.
PullString Platform
Machine Learning and Rules Based AI
AI EnginePrecision of rules based pattern
matching and the power of machine learned intent
IntentsModel high level user goals or use
built-in libraries to get started quickly
EntitiesExtract entities like names,
addresses, dates, and times and store them in state across conversations
RulesMaintain full control and precision
over the conversation with powerful pattern matching
SynonymsEasily define related concepts and
phrases, and automatically generate suggestions for new synonyms with powerful machine learning
Dialog ManagementEasy access to all the fundamental
building blocks of conversation like time-based responses, interjections, segues, activities, conditions, and priorities
Make anything talk. Anywhere.
Voice-enable IoT devices, apps, games, and other custom integrations
Simple RESTful HTTPS interface
PullString web APIs
External web APIsConnect to other web services
Simple JSON payload protocol
Embed Javascript in your content and we’ll execute it in a secure cloud sandbox
