Verbots Online Service Discontinued effective August 31
http://www.verbots.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=3636

Verbots Online closing down at the end of August
http://www.verbots.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=3637

> http://twitter.com/mendicot/status/245479984272134144

As of yesterday, the cloud hosted http://VerbotsOnline.com ceased operation; however, their desktop version lives on at http://Verbots.com :-(

> http://twitter.com/mendicot/status/245481032273506304

You can read more about the history, ups and downs, of Verbots (Verbal Robots) on their new “Official Verbots Blog” http://verbots.blogspot.com ..

> http://twitter.com/mendicot/status/245483094625366016

Reading Wikipedia .. Verbot (Verbal-Robot) http://goo.gl/YOxVl .. originally developed by @TeamToad & @thenar ..

> http://twitter.com/mendicot/status/245483747733041152

Watching video .. “TEDxMunich - Peter Plantec” http://youtu.be/7BR5r2TL1uM .. @thenar on Verbots, Virtual Personalities & Virtual Humans ..

> http://twitter.com/mendicot/status/245484459116359680

In honor of Conversive VerbotsOnline going out of business .. I’ve added a new Meta Guide webpage “Best Verbots Videos” http://bit.ly/T3e8UB

> http://twitter.com/mendicot/status/245485914623725568

Conspicuously absent from Twitter, Verbots parent company Conversive, Inc http://conversive.com can be found on LinkedIn http://goo.gl/k2D10

> http://twitter.com/mendicot/status/245487086201864192

Alternatives to Conversive VerbotsOnline include .. @bot_aco .. @chatbot4u .. @mycybertwin .. @pandorabots ..

> http://twitter.com/mendicot/status/254637894289993728

Matt Palmerlee @mpalmerlee is looking for help to open source a simple text only version of VerbotsOnline via github http://goo.gl/JzxkJ ..

> http://www.conversive.com

The latest chapter in the Conversive VerbotsOnline saga now has the VerbotsOnline parent company, Conversive, merged in some way with Avaya.  “Avaya is a global provider of business collaboration and communications solutions, providing unified communications, contact centers, networking and related services to companies of all sizes around the world.”

> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avaya

I think it’s interesting how other chatbot systems such as Lots-A-Bots and RunABot come and go, but Pandorabots, a free open-source-based website (free hosting) just goes on and on.

Yes Verbot Online closing down… But ! A nice man named Mike built a kind of
Verbot light. It’s just a first little test but that works without voice and animations
but that works… C# Server platform Windows. See here:
http://chatterbots-jeanneton-fr-athena-gb.org.uk/index.html
Athena speaks English and it’s French for Jeanneton.
Friendly.
Sylvain.

FYI, I’ve just written a new blog post about what I’m up to this year, as a result of the shut down:

A New Website For A New Age: GaiaPassage.com
http://www.mendicott.com/2013/03/a-new-website-for-new-age-gaiapassagecom.html

Before downloading the latest version of the engine Verbot and all additional files disappear. Here
is a recent address where you can download the latest motor:
http://www.glumsoft.com/software-29140-verbot.html
And here find various help files;
http://www.verbots.com/forums/downloads.php
Friendly.
Sylvain

Sylvain Leseur - Feb 25, 2013:

Yes Verbot Online closing down… But ! A nice man named Mike built a kind of
Verbot light. It’s just a first little test but that works without voice and animations
but that works… C# Server platform Windows. See here:
http://chatterbots-jeanneton-fr-athena-gb.org.uk/index.html

Not sure about the ‘nice’ part haha….... but thanks!

Yes, it is a c# web application implentation using the verbot source code. I haven’t had the time (not have the knowledge currently) to implement a moving lip-synced avatar. Would be nice though.

For ages I’ve been planning to put my own test bot version. Hopefully soon….

If anyone is interested in getting a community project of a new Verbots online, this would be great. General c# and visual studio knowledge, plus a working knowledge of Verbots is all that is needed.

Just curious, what made Verbot so special compared to the other bots available?

Good luck with getting an online version up. Sadly I have no development skills.

Verbot has an AIML like structure, but with a great GUI editor. Plus it has pre and post input and output processing, input and output synonyms, and the ability to attach code modules and put c# within the rule output.

Hi Mike,

In regards to Verbot, Conversive and Avaya I was a bit curious to understand what is / has really happened. I thought Avaya bought Conversive and I assumed to use the Verbot technology, so how come Verbot is still available and how come people want to put it online? Would that be based on the engine prior to the sale of Conversive? Aren’t there some legal restrictions set up by Avaya if they bought that technology?

Thanks,
Bora

Marcus, I read on your blog that you found it too much effort to stay integrated with the likes of Twitter. Did you ever check out Zapier.com ? With one integration to that service you have an integration to a lot of different web services and social media sites.
Admittedly I am a bit surprised this isn’t a standard integration in the likes of Pandorabots, clever script etc.

Bora - Jun 14, 2013:

Hi Mike,

In regards to Verbot, Conversive and Avaya I was a bit curious to understand what is / has really happened. I thought Avaya bought Conversive and I assumed to use the Verbot technology, so how come Verbot is still available and how come people want to put it online? Would that be based on the engine prior to the sale of Conversive? Aren’t there some legal restrictions set up by Avaya if they bought that technology?

Thanks,
Bora

Good question. As far as I know, the Verbot program is on-hold or effectively discontinued, although it is clear that the forum is still online and the product still downloadable.

Yes, Conversive became part of Avaya. Whether that means Avaya have also taken over the Verbot technology (and use it) I’m not sure. I always assumed the Conversive product was based on the same technology, but I am not sure.

It was suggested by a few people that the community should start its own forum in case Avaya decided keeping the Verbots forum was not useful. Therefore, I posted that I would do that, on the basis that it was supported by key community members, and that if Avaya wanted to re-start the program, they could take over or be recognised on the new forum, or if would be stopped if the original / current forum was the better place. Basically looking at it from the poinr of view of what is best for the development of Verbots.

That’s pretty much what I know.

As I said in the Verbots forum, I think it is a shame because they had / have a product that does something different to the other products out there. From taken an interest in some other chatbot programming scripts and tools, that’s not to say it is better or worse. But it is different in that it has it’s own GUI and rule structure (in some ways similar to AIML) but also the intergrated use of c#, great ideas (such as synonyms for input and output), and an open-source SDK for anyone to build there own version using c#.

I’ve personally found developing in Visual Studio with C# to be really interesting and opened my eyes to some new ways to get things done, especially with regards to taken code used for a desktop (console) application and being able to turn it into a web application, within the same framework.

I found VerbotsOnline much easier and cheaper than the commercial version of Pandorabots (plus third party add-ons such as voice and avatar) for instance, despite AIML being ultimately more powerful.

> http://www.mendicott.com/2013/09/dissecting-summarization-process.html

I’ve updated my blog with a new post about where I’m at, “Dissecting the Summarization Process” (above link).  In this post, I address my on-going issues with both AI “middleware”, including “iPaaS” (integration Platform as a Service) such as Zapier (link below), and with dialog system APIs in general.  In short, I’m looking for more (automated) control over the backend, in the form of an API into the knowledgebase, in addition to the “frontend” conversational user interface (CUI) API.

> http://www.meta-guide.com/home/about/best-of-the-best-videos/best-zapier-videos