Fred the Webmate

[2] Visitors to the chatterbot encountered a simple graphic interface: an animated character living in a small, very clean apartment.

Fred would then “answer” via a program that recognized keywords in the questions and drew responses from a large inventory of pre-scripted replies.

To enhance the sense that visitors were talking to a real person, Fred's replies were idiosyncratic, informed by a semi-realistic backstory created for the character.

He gave “answers” that were frequently off-topic due to his variable mood and could be angry, jealous, rude, sad or euphoric during a conversation.

Though he claimed to be happy, his script suggested otherwise, and continued to simulate “mood swings.” When Word Magazine was shut down in 2000, Fred the Webmate, along with the rest of the site, was preserved in the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.