The Akinator

[Silivren]

Has anyone ever done this? It's kind of like 20 questions but this web genie will guess ANY character you can think of eventually and I mean ANY. I just did this idk how many times and it got it every single time!

http://en.akinator.com/

[Makoes]

Just gave it a try, lol was pretty fun and it did guess the character I was thinking of XD!!

[Congafury]

Mother of God! He guessed Woland from Bulgakov's master and Margarita!! :O

[Gimlion]

It's an absolutely simple invention. Basically, it is 20 questions, only it's 'smart'. If you manage to trick the bastard, it will then ask you who you WERE thinking of, and logs which answers to which questions were asked. By doing this, eventually even the most random, unknown character you can think of, and answering questions in the trickiest possible answers will lead to your character. Basically, the more people the play, the better he gets. Last time I played, I managed to stump him 2 times out of hundreds. And I'm a very cunning, intelligent and cocky bastard, if that tells you anything. I imagine now, he'll damn near guess every character ever invented.

[Mozag]

I did seven of these in a row, almost all leading to over 60 questions, and only once did he guess correctly.

[Silivren]

Well to be honest I know how it works. That wasn't the point. The point was that it was really cool and fun to do. It's like a magic trick in the fact that even if you figure out how it works you don't need to go around telling people in my opinion. I'm sorry if that sounded harsh it just seems like you're trying to "explain" the fun out of it.

[Lupis]

Hey, no reason to be upset, Doctress. Gimlion didn't seem unimpressed with the game. Personally, I'm much like him in loving to learn how things work, and learning doesn't take the magic away, it just adds more. I'm always fascinated by how powerful such simple codes and algorithms can be.

He was just trying to inform the curious, I think, not take away anyone's fun. No need to snap.

[cowmuflage]

I think it's silly to tell people not to inform people on how this works. I think this is even better now that I know how it works (That's a reason I find Penn and teller to be the best magic act I know). Anyway if someone did not want to know how it works they don't need to read his post. It's that simple.

[Silivren]

I wasn't trying to snap. What I was trying to explain is while knowing how something works is cool for some it may not be that way for others. Some people also like to figure things out for themselves rather than be told as well. While Gim is very right I'd still like it to hold a little amazement as it is the most evolved 20 questions I've ever seen.

But either way I didn't post this to start a debate I posted it because its fun.

[Gimlion]

Sorry, Doc. I was more rambling about how ingenious it is, than trying to logic away the mysticism. The creation and thought behind the machine that is Akinator is by far some of the simplest work, yet only Akinator has done it. He makes the plainest of ideas into a wonder and fantastic mini-game that people can enjoy for literally hours, as the user taps into his mind for the wit and knowledge to best him.

I absolutely love it, explanation or not. Not b/c of what 'he' does, but b/c of what he makes us do. We have to think, deep into our minds to try and pull some initially insignificant character, so miniscule that he shouldn't ever be able to guess it, and then combat our wit versus his almost unlimited knowledge. Knowledge, that we unwittingly (often at least) give him in the first place.

How often do one really focus on the details of any character or person they know, let alone the small side-characters that most people won't know? It's just about never, unless you do so in a hobby or job. This creation makes the user do this, and for that, I love it. The simple and strangely impressive mechanics behind it are just icing to me.

[Silivren]

Sorry, Doc. I was more rambling about how ingenious it is, than trying to logic away the mysticism. The creation and thought behind the machine that is Akinator is by far some of the simplest work, yet only Akinator has done it. He makes the plainest of ideas into a wonder and fantastic mini-game that people can enjoy for literally hours, as the user taps into his mind for the wit and knowledge to best him.

I absolutely love it, explanation or not. Not b/c of what 'he' does, but b/c of what he makes us do. We have to think, deep into our minds to try and pull some initially insignificant character, so miniscule that he shouldn't ever be able to guess it, and then combat our wit versus his almost unlimited knowledge. Knowledge, that we unwittingly (often at least) give him in the first place.

How often do one really focus on the details of any character or person they know, let alone the small side-characters that most people won't know? It's just about never, unless you do so in a hobby or job. This creation makes the user do this, and for that, I love it. The simple and strangely impressive mechanics behind it are just icing to me.

I'm sorry as well and sir that's one hell of a beautiful explanation I approve of. It's how I felt when he bested me so quickly on an author I thought wasn't well known. Hell I found myself googling characters or people to give him the right answer and granted eventually even if it took a while he STILL knew. What is amazing to me is the sheer number of facts that are combined in one "game" there's a lot about many different people/characters. Stuff that had to take SERIOUS research to find.