Some of Facebook’s other bots that are already implemented (such as CNN’s)
Facebook’s bots are still in their infant days, and a lot of the apps are not ready to become part of your everyday life just yet.
Why? Because there are still a lot of shortfalls in natural language processing that developers are still figuring out how to fix before they can allow people to interact with bots.
But there’s one company that’s already managed to build a bot that can play nice with Facebook’s chat-based interface; the slightly inappropriately named And Chill is a movie recommendation engine that has got rid of the classical “like/dislike” model of suggestion.
Instead, And Chill wants to further pursue the reasons a viewer would prefer a certain movie. It’s also really easy to use: you can access the bot via Facebook Messenger or SMS.
After a few standard pleasantries, And Chill asks you to name a movie you liked and the reason why.
For example, one would say “I liked Me Before You because it was a romantic drama that was all about wits and heartwarming dialogue.” And Chill then takes apart these components, analyzes them, and recommends similar films based on your preferences.
The startup hasn’t exactly explained how its algorithm works, except for the general statement that it “uses a few different frameworks to detect patterns, attributes, and other factors” to recommend movies for viewers.
While the startup’s lack of transparency regarding the recommendation process might sound suspicious, you will forget all about it when you actually try it and receive valuable suggestions.
The bot is more likely to recommend movies you might like and are likely to not have seen yet. At the moment, the startup will take a few minutes to process your request. (“Are you ready? Say ‘GO’ to start! **Servers currently under extreme load! There may be some delays!**” is the message you might be seeing).
But don’t give up on them if you haven’t heard back yet because the startup explained that some requests require human input “to confirm what their data crunching gives them.”
Overall, the service will be much more helpful than having to scroll through hundreds of movies you might not even like. If you want to give it a try, head over to the Messenger chat and see whether it works for your or not.
Image Source: Variety
