Loebner Prize

The Loebner Prize was an annual competition in artificial intelligence that awarded prizes to the computer programs considered by the judges to be the most human-like. The prize is reported as defunct since 2020. The format of the competition was that of a standard Turing test. In each round, a human judge simultaneously held textual conversations with a computer program and a human being via computer. Based upon the responses, the judge would attempt to determine which was which. The contest was launched in 1990 by Hugh Loebner in conjunction with the Cambridge Center for Behavioral Studies, Massachusetts, United States. Beginning in 2014 it was organised by the AISB at Bletchley Park. It has also been associated with Flinders University, Dartmouth College, the Science Museum in London, University of Reading and Ulster University, Magee Campus, Derry, UK City of Culture. In 2004 and 2005, it was held in Loebner's apartment in New York City. Within the field of artificial intelligence, the Loebner Prize is somewhat controversial; the most prominent critic, Marvin Minsky, called it a publicity stunt that does not help the field along. In 2019 the format of the competition changed. There was no panel of judges. Instead, the chatbots were judged by the public and there were to be no human competitors. Originally, $2,000 was awarded for the most human-seeming program in the competition. The prize was$3,000 in 2005 and $2,250 in 2006. In 2008,$3,000 was awarded. In addition, there are two one-time-only prizes that have never been awarded. $25,000 is offered for the first program that judges cannot distinguish from a real human and which can convince judges that the human is the computer program.$100,000 is the reward for the first program that judges cannot distinguish from a real human in a Turing test that includes deciphering and understanding text, visual, and auditory input. Once this is achieved, the annual competition will end. The rules have varied over the years and early competitions featured restricted conversation Turing tests but since 1995 the discussion has been unrestricted.