Artificial companions, social bots and work bots: communicative robots as research objects of media and communication studies

Abstract

The aim of this article is to outline ‘communicative robots’ as an increasingly relevant field of media and communication research. Communicative robots are defined as autonomously operating systems designed for the purpose of quasi-communication with human beings to enable further algorithmic-based functionalities – often but not always on the basis of artificial intelligence. Examples of these communicative robots can be seen in the now familiar artificial companions such as Apple’s Siri or Amazon’s Alexa, the social bots present on social media platforms or work bots that automatically generate journalistic content. In all, the article proceeds in three steps. Initially, it takes a closer look at the three examples of artificial companions, social bots and work bots in order to accurately describe the phenomenon and their recent insinuation into everyday life. This will then allow me to grasp the challenges posed by the increasing need to deal with communicative robots in media and communication research. It is from this juncture from where I would like to draw back on the discussion about the automation of communication and clearly outline how communicative robots are more likely than physical artefacts to be experienced at the interface of automated communication and communicative automation.

Sex (Ro)bots

“…In the intersection of the aforementioned scholarships, we find the shared rejection of technology's neutrality and a focus on the structural powers and meanings of machines (Guzman, 2018). Despite the various calls to apply ANT in a new "laboratory" studies context for companion chatbot research (Hepp, 2020;Waldherr, 2019), the article proposes that the Castoriadian approach is more appropriate to conduct critical because it allows researchers to highlight the meaning and the power relations behind sex (ro)bots. In the next section, argumentation for adopting the Castoriadian framework to qualitative enquiry of sex (ro)bots within HMC is presented.…”

Strategi Komunikasi Politik Pemenangan Kepala Daerah

“…Berkomunikasi berarti kita sedang berusaha untuk mencapai kesamaan makna, -Commonness‖, atau dengan ungkapan lain melalui komunikasi seseorang mencoba berbagi informasi, gagasan, atau sikap kita sering mempunyai makna yang berbeda terhadap lambang yang sama (Suhardjo et al, 2019). Hepp (2020) memberikan gambaran bahwa ilmu komunikasi merupakan upaya yang sistematis untuk merumuskan secara tegar asas-asas penyampaian informasi serta pembentukan pendapat dan sikap.…”

“…Dalam mencapai tujuan komunikasi yang efektif, paradigma Hepp (2020) mengatakan bahwa cara yang baik untuk menjelaskan komunikasi terdapat lima unsur meliputi, komunikator, pesan, media, komunikan dan efek. Maka, dalam proses menyampaikan pesan oleh komunikator kepada komunikan dapat dikatakan efektif apabila media yang digunakan dalam penyampaian pesan dapat menimbulkan efek tertentu (Hepp, 2020).…”

Ontological Transparency, (In)visibility, and Hidden Curricula: Critical Pedagogy Amidst Contentious Edtech

“…This applies also in the use of automation in teaching as there is a risk of misleading the students in terms of their interactions with the teacher and institution. To avoid this, it is necessary to make it very clear that humans are humans and bots are bots, particularly those communicative robots, autonomous systems that serve the needs of human communication (Hepp 2020 ). It has also been argued that ontological transparency is needed around the tendencies to humanize automation.…”

“…Yet, this presents a context, prevalent in the data emerging from this study in a single academic institutional context, that runs largely counter to the more commercial actors, implementations, and imaginaries surrounding automation itself. These commercial implementations are examples of quasi-communication agents: ‘essentially a matter of attributing communication to a machine and not communication in the sense of human symbolic exchange as theorized in symbolic interactionism’ (Hepp 2020 : 4) with, in some cases, additional automated emotive functionalities (animated expressions emerging from the screen, for instance, that indicate the emotional state of the automation itself). The study discussed in this paper is a contrast here: there was clear indication that this automation should not be replicating emotive or perceived ‘human’ traits and should clearly identify itself as automation.…”