MELBOURNE, Australia, March 31, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- This year, the Melbourne International Comedy Festival is playing host to a unique performance by LOL-BOT, the world's first A.I. comedian.

Developed locally in Melbourne, it is one of the world's first robot prototypes capable of generating its own jokes, detecting real-time human reactions and reacting according to audience responses.

LOL-BOT is the first of its kind, serving as an example of the huge strides being made in artificial intelligence and machine learning.

Susan Provan, Melbourne International Comedy Festival's Festival Director, said the rapidly changing entertainment landscape is what encouraged the team to welcome LOL-BOT into the Festival.

"Melbourne International Comedy Festival is excited to welcome LOL.BOT as a special guest of the Festival. We think it's important for our audiences to experience comedy live, and LOL-BOT brings a fresh voice and innovative approach, pushing the definition of live comedy into a new and exciting direction," explains Ms Provan.

Melbourne International Comedy Festival aims to discover, develop and showcase great comedy talent for the entertainment and inspiration of a broad-based audience.

It is a world-class comedy event that attracts more than 700,000 people each year to enjoy the freshest and finest comedy voices from across the globe.

"We're building LOL-BOT to be the world's first A.I. live comedian" says Steven Nicholson, Creative Technologist.

"LOL-BOT has used stochastic modelling to pull data and learn from thousands of hours of live comedy shows. It can tease out meaning from these shows to learn how to generate new jokes."

"The cameras that LOL-BOT is equipped with can detect faces and make a reasonable best-guess as to the reaction it is getting from its jokes. It will also be listening for laughter."

"We're well down the road to creating a human-like A.I.: one that not only understands us, but even beings to behave like us," says Nicholson.

LaTrobe University's Head of Computer Science, Professor Henry Duh, explains the advancements made in Artificial Intelligence.

"We are very optimistic in the rapid advancement of artificial intelligence. The interaction between a human and a computing system is even more important than technology itself."

Melbourne International Comedy Festival runs until Sunday 23 April 2017.

Notes to editors:

You can find a short film detailing the development of LOL-BOT and footage of it hosting a stand-up show at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vhe-JOP7PCs&feature=youtu.be

Media contact: Nick Zonnios
               E: nick.zonnios@clemenger.com.au  
               P: +61-421-663-442

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SOURCE Melbourne International Comedy Festival