Alexa's laughing bouts highlight a fatal flaw in bot development

GUEST: The news about Amazon’s Alexa bursting out in spontaneous laughter would have been funnier if it hadn’t cast a spotlight on what’s wrong with the current approach to chatbots and virtual assistants. Amazon researchers programmed Alexa to deliver a rolling “ha ha ha” when users said, “Alexa, can you laugh?” The device began misinterpreting audio, […]