LINGUIST List 9.1191

Thu Aug 27 1998

Confs: Embodied Conversational Characters

Editor for this issue: Martin Jacobsen <martylinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Scott A. Prevost, Workshop on Embodied Conversational Characters

Call for Participation
 The First Workshop on Embodied
 Conversational Characters

 With support of AAAI
 Cooperation of ACM/SIGCHI

 Granlibakken Resort & Conference Center at Lake Tahoe
 Tahoe City (North Shore)
 California, USA

 October 12-15, 1998


Recent advances in several core software technologies have made
possible a new type of human-computer interface: the conversational
character. Conversational characters are autonomous, anthropomorphic,
animated figures that have the ability to communicate through multiple
modalities, including spoken language, facial expressions, and
gestures. Unlike textual natural language interfaces, conversational
characters have the ability to perceive and produce the verbal and
non-verbal signals that identify discourse structure and regulate the
flow of information between interlocutors. Such signals include
intonational patterns, gestures, back-channel feedback signals, and
turn-taking protocols. These capabilities enable them to engage in
complex interactions with human users via natural speech rather than
complex command languages, menus or graphical manipulations.

Research on conversational characters has emerged from a number of
disciplines, including, among others, artificial intelligence,
computational linguistics, computer animation, computer vision,
psychology, cognitive science, virtual reality, CSCW, and HCI. This
diversity is naturally reflected in the broad range of active research
areas in conversational character interfaces.

The primary goal of this workshop is to advance the state of
conversational character research and development by identifying novel
approaches to the topics and issues listed below, and integrating them
into a framework for embodied, conversational human-computer
interaction. A provisional program can be found at
http://www.fxpal.com/wecc98/.

Attendance

Attendance will be limited to 40 people. There will be space for a
few attendees who did not submit papers. Non-presenters wishing to
attend the workshop should submit a one page description of their
current research interests and their relation to the workshop themes.
Research descriptions should be emailed to prevostpal.xerox.com no
later than September 14, 1998. The list of attendees will be
finalized by September 18.


Workshop Organizers

Joseph W. Sullivan, FX Palo Alto Lab, USA (sullivanpal.xerox.com)
Justine Cassell, MIT Media Laboratory, USA (justinemedia.mit.edu)

Workshop Program Committee

Committee Co-Chairs: Scott Prevost, FX Palo Alto Lab, USA
(prevostpal.xerox.com) Elizabeth Churchill, FX Palo Alto Lab, USA
(churchillpal.xerox.com)

Committee Members: Elisabeth Andr, DFKI GmbH, Germany
(Elisabeth.Andredfki.de) Gene Ball, Microsoft Research, USA
(genebmicrosoft.com) Phil Cohen, Oregon Graduate Institute, USA
(pcohencse.ogi.edu) Barbara Hayes-Roth, Stanford Univ., USA
(hayes-rothcs.stanford.edu) Kenji Mase, ATR International, Japan
(masemic.atr.co.jp) Clifford Nass, Stanford University, USA
(nassleland.stanford.edu) Mark Steedman, University of Pennsylvania,
USA (steedmancis.upenn.edu) Kris Thorisson, Lego A/S, Denmark
(krisdigi.lego.com)

Demos Chair:
Timothy Bickmore, ISII Inc., USA (bickmorepal.xerox.com)

Additional Information

For more information, please consult the workshop web page:
www.fxpal.com/wecc98/