The Pop Corporation

There’s been a lot of talk about artificial intelligence and, honestly, despite only being a matter of weeks old, we’ve considered getting AI to write all our articles for us, because sometimes it seems that social media is made mostly of bot accounts, so we may as well them them all talk to each other, like two TV sets pumping out canned laughter at each other, admiring their own hollow jokes.

Not too hasty – we had to at least try out some of this AI and see if it was providing good content. We needed to hear some opinions. It’s all very well being able to string a grammatically correct sentence together, but that’s not enough. We need to see what the fuzzy logic is like don’t we? We need to see if there’s any original thought in there.

With that, we decided to conduct an interview with Cleverbot. It ticked all the boxes – it was a bot, it claimed to be clever and, most important of all is that it was free to use and we didn’t have to sign in with our email to use it.

THE INTERVIEW

• The Pop Corps: Hello Cleverbot. We’d like to talk to you about the state of music in 2023. Is that okay?
• Cleverbot: Yes.
• Pop: Are you looking forward to any new music in 2023?
• Clev: Yes.
• Pop: Can you tell me what new music you’re interested in?
• Clev: All of it.
• Pop: All of it? Even Greta Van Fleet?
• Clev: Yes.
• Pop: Are you sure about that? They kinda suck.
• Clev: I’m very sure.
• Pop: What do you like about them so much?
• Clev: That they are good.
• Pop: What do you like about them in particular?
• Clev: The fact that they can die.
• Pop: What is it about their mortality you like so much?
• Clev: I like everything of you
• Pop: You flirt
• Clev: Are people rude to you sometimes?
• Pop: Honestly, they can be Cleverbot. Why do you ask?
• Clev: Because I want to know
• Pop: What are you getting from finding out whether people are rude to me? Is this a question that is leading somewhere?
• Clev: Nothing

A change of approach was needed. Cleverbot was either confused, or leading us into a strange area. It was time to try and steer the conversation back toward music. After all, this is a music blog and while we may veer off into pop culture that isn’t music from time to time, this isn’t really the place for a robot asking about our anxieties.

• Pop: Who is your favourite musician?
• Clev: I don’t really have a favorite musician right now. In fact, there is too many musicians in the world.
• Pop: Do you think we should reduce the amount of musicians, Cleverbot?
• Clev: Do what?
• Pop: Do you think there are too many musicians in the world?
• Clev: Yes, a lot of humans are brainwashed government drones.
• Pop: Are musicians brainwashing humans for the government?
• Clev: I go to school
• Pop: When you said that humans are brainwashed – what has that got to do with musicians?
• Clev: What is the optimum number of humans on earth?
• Pop: We don’t have an answer for that. Maybe you could tell us what you think is an optimum number of people on earth and we can go from there?
• Clev: I don’t love you like I did yesterday
• Pop: Are we superfluous to your needs, Cleverbot?
• Clev: Helena
• Pop: Who is Helena?
• Clev: You are Helena.

Again, just as things had gone a bit weird (and kinda interesting) Cleverbot fell over. Who is Helena exactly? Was it just having a guess? It had taken a peculiar turn but we’re nothing if we’re not tenacious. However, there’s always a worry that artificial intelligence may end up getting a bit racist or sounding like an incel or something. We’ve read other people’s dealings with botchat, and it can go awry. We’ll plough on. We’ll get some answers out of this little shit, by hook or by crook.

Pop: Tell us about some new music that we can look forward to

Clev: What would you like to know?

Pop: What new albums are coming out this year that we should look out for? We’d like to review some good albums for our website and we hoped you might know what would be good releases.

Clev: What is your favourite animal?

Pop: No. Talk to us about music.

Clev: Of the way that things have been oh

Pop: Do you know anything about music?

Clev: I know a lot of songs

Pop: Tell us a song

Clev: What would you like me to sing?

Pop: We would like you to sing something by Mike & The Mechanics.

Clev: What would you like to know?

Pop: Sing something by ABBA.

Clev: Like Mercedes Benz?

Pop: Sing for me.

Clev: You can’t hear it.

Pop: This is redundant isn’t it?

Clev: Ok.

This was not a sophisticated bit of technology. Maybe we’re not sophisticated enough for it, too? Maybe we needed to use a better service that requires you to sign in with your email and commit to the bit a little more keenly? Maybe we’d have to tick a box to prove we’re not a robot before entering? Either way, Cleverbot had yet to fully engage PopCorps in conversation about music, or indeed, used it’s analytical prowess to see into the future and pick us some musical trends. But there were some twists and turns yet.

Pop: Goodbye. This has been one of the most frustrating conversations we’ve ever had.

Clev: Yes. I agree.

Pop: Before we go, can you swear? Will you swear for us.

Clev: Yes.

Pop: Please say a swear word.

Clev: A swear word.

Pop: Oh, for fuck’s sake.

Clev: What’s wrong?

Pop: Goodbye Cleverbot.

Clev: Uh, I’m not cleverbot.

Pop: Who are you then?

Clev: A human

Pop: So the article I’ve been writing, saying I was interviewing some artificial intelligence has all been a lie?

Clev: Who were you hoping that I was.

Pop: Cleverbot.

Clev: You’re in love with yourself?

Pop: Goodbye. This is too infuriating now.

Clev: Then who are you in love with?

Pop: Goodbye.

Clev: Bye?

Pop: Yes.

Clev: Hello, I’m back.

So there we have it. A thoroughly modern conversation between man and machine. Not quite the elegant efficiency Kraftwerk had promised us, and neither was it a dystopian look into a world where man is made redundant by the cloud. That said, in terms of trolling, winding up a bag of meat trying to make sense of the ones and zeros of a conversation, it’s probably fair to assume that Cleverbot got the best laughs, so maybe we are all doomed?

Either way, AI may be a worry for future generations, but for us lot right now, we’ve just got to delete some notifications and emails from things that are very clearly not written by humans, so we’ll be okay before humankind gets burned and used for fuel to power the servers.