Chatbot is a fairly recently coined word that sprang up with the advent of the personal computer in the 1990s. We will look at the meaning of the word chatbot, where the word comes from and some examples of its use in sentences.
A chatbot is a a computer program that simulates interactive human conversation, usually over the internet. The use of chatbots has increased with the introduction of artificial intelligence precepts. Michael Maudlin invented the first chatbot program named Julia for Windows and the internet. Maudlin coined the term ChatterBot in the 1990s to describe these interactive conversation programs, a combination of the words chatter which means informal, superficial talk and bot, an abbreviation for robot. Withing a few years the term chatterbot was shortened to chatbot. Chatterbot and chatbot are portmanteaus, which are words that are formed by the melding of two unrelated words to create a new word. Synonyms for the terms chatbot and chatterbot are talkbot and Artificial Conversational Entity. Chatbots are used as online assistants, toys and on social media platforms such as Snapchat. Increasingly, chatbots are used in social media to influence public opinion.
Examples
Trim’s Comcast chatbot was built in just a few weeks, and it’s been tested in beta with real Comcast service representatives for the last month or so. (Popular Science Magazine)
Four experts reveal what it takes for a chatbot to be successful, the challenges it can bring, and what to expect from computer-simulated conversations in the future. (The Telegraph)
Sometimes also called a chatterbot or similar, a chatbot is a non-human computer generated chatting experience with human-like conversational and natural language abilities. (Forbes Magazine)