Welcome to Companions
COMPANIONS aims to change the way we think about the relationships of people to computers and the Internet by developing a virtual conversational 'Companion'.
This will be an agent or 'presence' that stays with the user for long periods of time, developing a relationship and 'knowing' its owners preferences and wishes. It will communicate with the user primarily by using and understanding speech, but also using other technologies such as touch screens and sensors.
The project is led by Professor Yorick Wilks of the University of Sheffield and consists of a consortium of 14 partners from across Europe and the US. The European Commission is funding the project as part of its 6th Research Framework, specifically as part of its focus on Information Society Technologies.
Building Companions
Companions Research brings together experts in a range of cutting edge technologies including dialogue management, speech recognition and synthesis, embodied conversational agents, and human-computer interaction.
Being with Companions
The Companions Demonstrators will show off the capabilities of the technology, and a number of components or modules that future research and products can build on to create a variety of Companions.
Companions people: Paris meeting photos available on Flickr
Companions Talk
Yorick Wilks: New research shows robots and animals DO cheer the old
Christopher Brewster: AI Researchers Say 'Rascals' Might Pass Turing Test
Yorick Wilks: Should Companions be like people who cannot forget?
Yorick Wilks: People not always needed to alleviate loneliness: Many try to identify with animals, gadgets, spiritual beliefs
Yorick Wilks: David Levy on the Colbert Show in the US
Yorick Wilks: A program that mimics online flirtation to extract personal information from its unsuspecting conversation partners: Beware flirting Companions in Russia
Oli Mival: A virtual maths teacher reacts to the emotional state of the children interacting with it and responds appropriately: Eve, the virtual maths teacher
Yorick Wilks: Microsoft Cambridge experiments with SenseCam show 'astonishing' results in improving long term memory recall of Alzheimer's sufferers
Yorick Wilks: A robot teddy that can interact with its owner and could alert medical staff to changes in a sick child's condition: MIT teddy bear companion to be tested on Scottish children!
Companions News and Events
Bellagio 2008: The Fourth International Workshop on Human-Computer Conversation brings together academic researchers and industrialists concerned with all aspects of human-computer conversation and the associated research issues of emotion, relationships, companionship, embodiment, ECAs, memory, evaluation etc. Abstract deadline: 1 July 2008
New Demonstrator: Discussing photos with the Senior Companion (YouTube)
Discussion Paper: Summary of a forum on Artificial Companions in Society: Peltu, M. and Wilks, Y. (2008) Engaging with Artificial Companions: Key Social, Psychological, Ethical and Design Issues (pdf, 255kb)
Press: Is There Progress on Talking Sensibly to Machines? (Science, 9 Nov 2007)
Memories for Life: Listen to Yorick Wilks discussing Memories for Life on The Material World (BBC Radio 4). In the near future we could be storing all our memories for ever: who will keep them, could they be kept private and how would it change our own concept of who we are?
Funding
European Commission Sixth Framework Programme
Information Society Technologies Integrated Project IST-34434
Updated: 25 March 2008 15:57 PM