Is this Web site a foreshadow of robots and computers taking over the world?

ABC Nightline piece: http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=2461422

Meet Joan, the world's most human computer programme. She's won a prestigious prize for artificial intelligence after chatting up the judges.

Channel 4 News Article and TV Report: http://www.channel4.com/news/special-reports/special-reports-storypage.jsp?id=3311

Meet George. He's single, 'smart', quirky, multi-lingual and in his 30s. Oh and I forgot to mention that he is not human - he's a robot.

George is a chatbot - a product of artificial intelligence research, which is designed to talk to humans in an interesting and entertaining way.

i-UK Article: http://www.i-uk.com/

One day call centres will be obsolete and instead we'll buy our goods and services from artificially intelligent avatars - 'marketingbots' are the future of sales. That's a vision already in the making at HMC Marketing

'AI in online transactions and real time transactions helps create interactions that are more meaningful, entertaining, delighting and endearing customers,' says HMC Marketing, who are in the process of creating the sales force of the future.

Creative Match Article: http://www.creativematch.co.uk/viewNews/?92730

London: The unlikely star of one of Europe's leading science festivals takes to the world stage on Thursday but the 39-year-old polymath linguist singleton called George is that ultimate curiosity - an avatar or an AIvtar (Artificial Intelligence avatar), in other words, a virtual human.

George, who is a chat robot or chatbot, is believed to be the forerunner of a whole new race soon to populate our planet. His descendants, say scientists and starry-eyed anoraks, may soon become familiar faces around the world in interactive entertainment systems, advertising, selling insurance or used cars or even answering the phones in call centres.

Times of India: article