<div align="justify">Facebook's artificial intelligence researchers announced today they had broken new ground by giving automated programs or "bots" the ability to negotiate, and make compromises.<br /><br />The new technology pushes forward the ability to create bots "that can reason, converse and negotiate, all key steps in building a personalized digital assistant," said researchers Mike Lewis and Dhruv Batra in a blog post.<br /><br />Up to now, most bots or chatbots have had only the ability to hold short conversations and perform simple tasks like booking a restaurant table, according to the researchers.<br /><br />But in the latest code developed by Facebook, bots will be able to dialogue and "to engage in start-to-finish negotiations with other bots or people while arriving at common decisions or outcomes," they wrote.<br /><br />Facebook's Artificial Intelligence Researchers (FAIR) team gave bots this ability by estimating the "value" of an item and inferring how much that is worth to each party.<br /><br />"FAIR researchers created many such negotiation scenarios, always ensuring that it is impossible for both agents to get the best deal simultaneously," Lewis and Batra said.<br /><br />"Furthermore, walking away from the negotiation (or not agreeing on a deal after 10 rounds of dialogue) resulted in 0 points for both agents. Simply put, negotiation is essential, and good negotiation results in better performance."<br /><br />But the bots can also find ways to be sneaky.<br /><br />In some cases, bots "initially feigned interest in a valueless item, only to later 'compromise' by conceding it -- an effective negotiating tactic that people use regularly," the researchers said.<br /><br />This behavior was not programmed by the researchers "but was discovered by the bot as a method for trying to achieve its goals," they said.</div>
<div align="justify">Facebook's artificial intelligence researchers announced today they had broken new ground by giving automated programs or "bots" the ability to negotiate, and make compromises.<br /><br />The new technology pushes forward the ability to create bots "that can reason, converse and negotiate, all key steps in building a personalized digital assistant," said researchers Mike Lewis and Dhruv Batra in a blog post.<br /><br />Up to now, most bots or chatbots have had only the ability to hold short conversations and perform simple tasks like booking a restaurant table, according to the researchers.<br /><br />But in the latest code developed by Facebook, bots will be able to dialogue and "to engage in start-to-finish negotiations with other bots or people while arriving at common decisions or outcomes," they wrote.<br /><br />Facebook's Artificial Intelligence Researchers (FAIR) team gave bots this ability by estimating the "value" of an item and inferring how much that is worth to each party.<br /><br />"FAIR researchers created many such negotiation scenarios, always ensuring that it is impossible for both agents to get the best deal simultaneously," Lewis and Batra said.<br /><br />"Furthermore, walking away from the negotiation (or not agreeing on a deal after 10 rounds of dialogue) resulted in 0 points for both agents. Simply put, negotiation is essential, and good negotiation results in better performance."<br /><br />But the bots can also find ways to be sneaky.<br /><br />In some cases, bots "initially feigned interest in a valueless item, only to later 'compromise' by conceding it -- an effective negotiating tactic that people use regularly," the researchers said.<br /><br />This behavior was not programmed by the researchers "but was discovered by the bot as a method for trying to achieve its goals," they said.</div>