A better diagramatic view

Here is an updated version of the diagram. I was concerned by the Ptolemaic positioning of the playwright at the center of the production universe. 


The structures remain unchanged but this diagram suggests that these structures are internalized within the playwright. I think this better describes the process and accords with the work of Bourdieu (habitus and field of works) and Csikszentmihalyi (domain acquisition and field). 

(Note - This is version 5 of the diagram. As I've been writing the associated section of the literature review I've refined the titles used on the sections.)

People finding a paper of mine

I have an account on Academia.edu - the professional networking site for academics (http://newcastle-au.academia.edu/MichaelMeany). Recently, over the past month or so, I've been getting a number of notifications saying that people from all over the world have been finding my work - usually through Google searches.

In particular, the paper that has been attracting the most interest is one I delivered at a conference in 2007 titled 'Humour, Anxiety, and Csikszentmihalyi's concept of Flow'. ( http://www.inter-disciplinary.net/ati/education/cp/ce3/meany%20paper.pdf )

I'm certainly not saying this is the academic must-read of the season, however, it does suggest that the title of this paper, if nothing else, has struck a chord in the zeitgeist. The combination of humour theory and creativity theory looks to be a rich field.

A diagramatic view of the project

Over the past couple of weeks I've been battling with the script writing section of my literature review. This is a area where I've had some experience, both as a playwright and as a researcher. So, I thought it would be easier than earlier sections - I was wrong in so many ways.

Last night I had an epiphany... It was one of those rare moments of clarity. I was looking for a way to describe the relationships between the playwright, the scripted dialogue and the interface (will all the attendant technology).

A playwright's job is far more than simply writing the words to be delivered. As the suffix 'wright' suggests, the job requires an understanding of the entire production process, just as a shipwright needs to more than a woodworker or welder to build a ship. The playwright needs to grapple with technology and industry of production - what is possible on a live theatre stage and how it can be achieved. For example, there is no point attempting to stage a film script that requires truckloads of CGI (imagine trying to stage Avatar).

The diagram here represents the structural layers of the project - each of which offer an unique level of agency. The further from the centre the less direct influence the playwright has. This is not to say that at the outer edge the playwright is completely powerless - at this point the playwright is still making choices but they are largely constrained by the structure. In this project I will depending upon the 'kindness of strangers' - the good people who develop and distribute web browsers. Without them the project would not have a 'theatre'. In production, a play needs to be adjusted to fit the stage and these choices are examples of the agency of the director and playwright. They are choices made within a constrained structure.

Skipping to the inner circles, the structure nearest to the playwright is the AIML of the two characters - Atomic Playboy and Radiation Romeo. The situation here is almost the reverse of the outer shell. The structure of AIML, based on XML, is so open that the characters can be scripted to say anything. The choices here, for the playwright, are those that any playwright would face - what to leave in and what to leave out.

The playwright at the core of the project is not an 'atomic' unit, not indivisible. Rather, the playwright is a construction of a whole other set of contributing elements - habitus, domain acquisition, writing experience, personal preference, genetics etc. These things I'll be dealing with in other sections of the literature review.

New chat bot characters

The very first play I wrote for Footlice Theatre Company was a one-act black(ish) comedy called 'The Atomic Playboy and the Radiation Romeo Fall in Love'. That was 1993.

Set in a student residence, it tells the story of a love triangle between the Atomic Playboy (a PhD student), the Radiation Romeo (an under-graduate student befriended by the Atomic Playboy) and the Thoroughly Post-Modern Milly (an undergraduate student who, as a post-modern gesture, only speaks in recognisable quotes).

For this project I'm considering bringing Atomic and Romeo back to life. Maybe only Romeo will actually be 'alive'. Atomic's back story is a bit more complicated. Atomic is dead. However, before he shuffled off this mortal coil, he had programmed a chat-bot with his 'wisdom' and witticisms. Romeo has faithfully kept Atomic going over the years by creating a chat-bot of himself for Atomic to talk to.

This set-up seems to have a couple of advantages. First, by fixing Atomic in time (his knowledge of the world has stalled in the mid 1990s - so 20th Century!) this allows him an idiosyncratic view of the world. Romeo, and the audience, know more of the world than he does. Second, it reverses the roles they played in the original script - the 'worldly' Atomic and the 'naive' Romeo. This is a good 'odd-couple' mix. Third, the unresolved romantic tension over their relationship with the 'Thoroughly Post-Modern Milly' is a nice piece of relationship business. Finally, as Romeo is still alive when the user is watching the interchange it's possible they could be seeing the 'human' Romeo conversing with Atomic or they could be watching the chat-bot 'Romeo' at work. This human / non-human character of Romeo will be introduced in the setup page of the chat-bot site.

The next production question is: How much 'standard' AIML should I use? As one of the recent comments pointed out the single sentence conversations are much more punchy and useful. Editing out all of the multiple sentence replies is tedious. However, starting completely from scratch ( an absolutely blank slate that doesn't even know how to respond to "Hello") could be equally time consuming. There is a certain purity to the blank slate...

Things to consider.

Another 'test' version...

This version of the interface is a test of stage setting material. I've added a curtain opening and a bit of introductory text just to see how it would all work.



You can clear all the fields and all the text by clicking the 'Clear' button.

Most of the dialog is based on the standard Alice set. However, a few AIML elements have been changed - those relating to 'animals', 'ducks' and a few other oddities.

Have a play and let me know what you think.

This is a link will open a new browser window displaying the Flash .swf interface of Version 16

The bots are hosted on the Pandorabots site ( Pandorabots )

A topic word or a sentence?

I've been playing with Dick Trickster and Detayle Bhoy today. These guys are my proof of concept bots - the final ones may be the "Atomic Playboy" and the "Radiation Romeo" - more of that later...

Anyway, I'm debating whether to invite the user to put in a topic word, such as 'ducks' or 'climate change', and then have Detayle Bhoy ask Dick Trickster a pre-formed question like - What do you know about X? I could then concatenate the user's topic word, replacing the X, with the question to get something like - What do you know about ducks?

This has a couple of advantages. First it will be easier to train the initial responses as the vast majority of inputs will be nouns - concrete or otherwise. Second, the structure of the input as a question is an obvious conversation starter. The downside is that it may look a little contrived.

Allowing the user to put in a sentence, for example, 'How are you feeling today?' means that (in the current development) Detayle Bhoy picks up that sentence and delivers it to Dick Trickster. This is acceptable but it doesn't automatically start a conversation between to the two bots. The user, once they have asked the question is left out of the conversation - just a little alienating.

We'll see how it goes.

Problem solved...

Thanks to Dr Wallace and the good people at Pandorabots my project has a 'home'.

I've purchased an account of the Shared Service to host my bots. We're back in business. This is also a much more open, transparent, and professional way of undertaking the research.

I really appreciate the enthusiasm and support I've received from Pandorabots - thanks guys!