What is a Chatbot? 💬

What's a Chatbot?

A chatbot is a computer program that can have a conversation with you — by text or voice!

You've probably talked to one without realising:

• 💬 That "How can I help you?" popup on websites
• 📦 Amazon/Deliveroo delivery status
• 🎮 Customer support for games
• 🏥 NHS symptom checker

📜 The Wild History of Chatbots

1966: ELIZA — The World's First Chatbot 🤣

ELIZA was created by MIT professor Joseph Weizenbaum. It pretended to be a therapist:

User: "I'm feeling really sad today" ELIZA: "Tell me more about feeling really sad today." User: "My mother doesn't understand me" ELIZA: "Tell me more about your family." User: "Are you actually listening to me?" ELIZA: "Why do you ask if I am actually listening to you?"

ELIZA couldn't understand anything — it just repeated words back with "Tell me more" templates. But people genuinely thought it was intelligent! Weizenbaum was horrified. 😅

1995-2010: Rule-Based Chatbots

IF user says "hello" → say "Hi there! How can I help?" IF user says "order" → say "Your order number is..." IF nothing matches → say "Sorry, I didn't understand that"

Simple but limited. Could only handle what was programmed!

2016+: AI Chatbots Change Everything

Modern AI chatbots like Siri and Alexa could understand context and natural language.

2022: ChatGPT Shocks the World 🌎

ChatGPT could: write essays, debug code, explain complex topics, write poetry, solve maths...

It reached 1 million users in 5 days (Netflix took 3.5 YEARS to reach that!) 🤯

💡 Two Types of Chatbots

| Rule-Based | AI Chatbot | |-----------|-----------| | Follows a script | Learns from data | | Can't handle surprises | Handles new questions | | Fast and predictable | Flexible and creative | | Simple to build | Complex to build | | Used for: FAQ bots, menus | Used for: General chat, Siri |