IBM Project Debater – will AI eliminate speechwriters?

IQ2I caught a rebroadcast of an Intelligence Squared debate on NPR last night.

Intelligence Squared is a weekly forum for balanced and intelligent debate. Their goal is to restore critical thinking, facts, reason, and civility to American public discourse. (Hurray for them, although I can’t help thinking they’re pissing into the prevailing wind these days.)

The episode I tuned into was first broadcast February 11, 2019 and featured a unique debate between a world-class champion debater and an Artificial Intelligence (AI) system developed by IBM called Project Debater.

While the program was a fascinating glimpse into the rather arcane world of debating, it was the implications for speechwriters that had me wondering if we’re fast approaching the time when AI will replace the need for a human being to be involved in writing well constructed, persuasive speeches.

Project Debater

Project DebaterProject Debater faced off against Harish Natarajan, a grand finalist at the 2016 World Debating Championships and winner of the 2012 European Debating Championship. His opponent at the IBM Think conference in San Francisco was Project Debater — a two-metre-tall black box. She spoke in an American female voice through a blue, animated mouth. IBM claims that it’s the first AI system that can debate humans on complex topics.

2001 A Space OdysseyDespite the rather uncanny resemblance to the black obelisk that features in the opening scene of Kubrick’s 2001 A Space Odyssey, the system exhibits none of the menace of the HAL system in that dystopian view of AI.

How it works

Project Debater is designed to debate humans on complex topics using a combination of pioneering research developed by IBM, including: data-driven speechwriting and delivery, listening comprehension, and modeling human dilemmas.

It goes beyond the Watson system that famously beat a human on the TV Quiz show Jeopardy, which showed a machine could respond to open-ended questions.

Project Debater digests massive texts, constructs a well-structured speech on a given topic, delivers it with clarity and purpose, and rebuts its opponent. Eventually, IBM claim, Project Debater will help people reason by providing compelling, evidence-based arguments and limiting the influence of emotion, bias, or ambiguity.

Isn’t that part of your job description, speechwriters?

Speechwriting by numbers?

The IBM website does not mince words about the capabilities of their system:

Project Debater relies on three pioneering capabilities. The first is data-driven speech writing and delivery, or the ability to automatically generate a whole speech, reminiscent of an opinion article, and deliver it persuasively. The second is listening comprehension, which is the ability to understand a long spontaneous speech made by the human opponent in order to construct a meaningful rebuttal. The third is the system’s ability to model human dilemmas and form principled arguments made by humans in different debates based on a unique knowledge graph. By combining these core capabilities, it can conduct a meaningful debate with human debaters.

Of note:

  • Unlike speechwriters today, the AI system had no access to the internet.
  • The massive amount of stored data it deployed was logically organized and presented in a fraction of the time most writers would take.
  • Impressively, the system created an argument that clearly supported the side of the argument it was assigned.
  • The system synthesized input from the debate opponent — a win when a speaker needs to respond, as in political dialog.
  • Further, the AI system could easily frame both sides of a debate, helping speechwriters anticipate opposing points of view.

Overall, a sobering development.

Team player?

The question is, can speechwriters look to AI systems to be team players? Many would appreciate it if AI did the leg work assembling facts and blocking out the basic arguments. They could then give a final polish to the machines’ draft.

Or will an AI enabled speech writing entity get to the point where it will refuse to “open the pod bay door” and leave the human out in the cold? What job security can speechwriters expect in a world where AI systems can create persuasive, logical, and well-researched speeches in a fraction of the time a human could?

What say you?

A Conversation with Ian Griffin on Speechwriting, Social Media & Blogging

On Thursday, December 13 the Silicon Valley Speeechwriters Roundtable hosted Ian Griffin in a free conference call.

I’m usually the one doing the interviewing. However, Barbara Seymour Giordano suggested she turn the tables and interview me. Barbara had been my guest back in May.

Barbara and I discussed my career as a freelance speechwriter, corporate employee, and blogger. We reviewed how I got into speechwriting, my experience in Silicon Valley companies, my Professionally Speaking blog as well as my new Booch News venture, and more.

To hear the full discussion, click on the podcast icon below.

A Conversation with Jeff Davenport on Speechwriting, Screenwriting and Delivery Coaching

Jeff DavenportOn Thursday, August 30th the Silicon Valley Speechwriters Roundtable hosted Jeff Davenport in a free conference call.

Jeff serves as an executive speaker coach and senior content developer at Duarte, the well-known communication design and consulting firm based in Santa Clara, founded by Nancy Duarte.

Using his background as a screenwriter and professional public speaker, Jeff helps clients communicate powerfully and persuasively by infusing story, dynamism, and empathy into their presentations. Whether he’s coaching high-level executives or thought leaders taking the stage for conference keynotes or commencement addresses, Jeff brings a thoughtful, personal touch to his roles, tapping into speakers’ personal passions and helping them create lasting connections with their audiences.

Jeff is a 2017 Cicero Award winner in the Public Policy category for his speech ‘Someday is Today’ delivered by Carlos Rodriguez-Pastor at CADE in Lima, Peru.

The call covered a wide range of topics including:

  • How he went from a wallflower in high school to a premier public speaking coach.
  • The secrets of the “Duarte Method” that any and all speechwriters can employ (Hint: read Resonate and Illuminate).
  • The value of the DataStory training workshop available from Duarte that helps speechwriters structure a compelling argument based on analytical data.
  • The three books on screenwriting he recommends speechwriters read:
    1. Screenplay: The Foundations of Screenwriting, by Syd Field
    2. Save the Cat!, by Blake Snyder
    3. Into the Woods, by John Yorke
  • What you’ll learn by watching the directors cut of Toy Story 3 on Blu-Ray.

Jeff’s parting words:

I would encourage anybody to do more public speaking, especially if you are writing for other people. We all had PE teachers who we realized never once played a sport. They were terrible PE teachers. So get out there and know what it’s like to play. Take a public speaking class. It doesn’t matter what it’s about. Do some sort of public speaking, writing for yourself and delivering yourself so you can get more in the heads of your clients and what know their true struggles are.

Otherwise, I would add, you’re forever the virgin trying to write a sex manual, aren’t you?

To hear the full discussion click on the podcast icon below.

Don’t quote me on that …

Two letters from Wednesday’s edition of the Financial Times attribute a quote about the difficult of writing a short speech or letter rather than a much longer one to two different sources. Financial Times letters

Pascale’s quote is translated as “The present letter is a very long one, simply because I had no leisure to make it shorter.”

Woodrow Wilson’s quote is variously represented as

If I am to speak ten minutes, I need a week for preparation; if fifteen minutes, three days; if half an hour, two days; if an hour, I am ready now.

The debate over who to attribute the quote to has been analyzed in depth by the Quote Investigator — an invaluable resource — which finds evidence for a number of sources including Woodrow Wilson; Abraham Lincoln; Rufus Choate; Thomas B. Macaulay; William Howard Taft and Mark Twain.

No matter the degree of difficulty, the final word on the value of short speeches goes to British Prime Minister Winston Churchill:

A good speech should be like a woman’s skirt; long enough to cover the subject and short enough to create interest.

Mini Skirts

However, the Quote Investigator finds that Churchill was re-stating a saying that had been in circulation for over 20 years.

Announcing: A Conversation with Jeff Davenport

Jeff DavenportOn Thursday, August 30th the Silicon Valley Speechwriters Roundtable will host Jeff Davenport in a free conference call.

Jeff serves as an executive speaker coach and senior content developer at Duarte, the well-known communication design and consulting firm based in Santa Clara, founded by Nancy Duarte.

Using his background as a screenwriter and professional public speaker, Jeff helps clients communicate powerfully and persuasively by infusing story, dynamism, and empathy into their presentations. Whether he’s coaching high-level executives or thought leaders taking the stage for conference keynotes or commencement addresses, Jeff brings a thoughtful, personal touch to his roles, tapping into speakers’ personal passions and helping them create lasting connections with their audiences.

Jeff is a 2017 Cicero Award winner in the Public Policy category for his speech ‘Someday is Today’ delivered by Carlos Rodriguez-Pastor at CADE in Lima, Peru.

In this call we’ll discuss the background to the Cicero Award-winning speech and the “Duarte Method” Jeff employs with his clients. Jeff is also an accomplished screenwriter and a firm believer in the use of the story structure in speeches. Finally, we’ll touch on why he believes speechwriters must write with delivery in mind, and share his secret for pitching a completed speech to the client to ensure successful delivery from the podium.

Click here to RSVP for this free conference call.

Hey! Hey! LBJ! How many speechwriters did you kill today?

LBJThanks to David Murray for pointing to a piece from DelanceyPlace.com about President Lyndon Johnson’s relentless work schedule that exhausted most of those who worked for him in the West Wing. This from the book Organizing the Presidency by Stephen Hess

He worked a two-shift day, 7:00 A.M. to 2:00 P.M. and 4:00 P.M. to 9:00 P.M. Between 2:00 P.M. and 4:00 P.M. he took a walk, swam, ate lunch, napped, showered, and changed clothes. Then, returning to his office, he was known to say, “It’s like starting a new day.” Top assistants were expected to be available at all times, for both shifts.

This relentless determination to do more of everything for as long as he would be in office inevitably took its toll on those around him. For example, in 1964, an election year, when he made 424 speeches, almost everyone on the staff was pressed into service as a presidential scribe, and everyone joined the constant talent search for speechwriters. The length of the day, the intensity of the work, and Johnson’s reputation for verbally abusing those close to him also meant a ceaseless turnover of presidential assistants, which gave the executive mansion “the appearance of a well-slept rooming house.”

The challenge of working as a speechwriter in the Johnson White House are highlighted by Robert Schlesinger in his excellent book White House Ghosts. Writers had

…a struggle to find the right balance in Johnson’s rhetoric…His insecurities and moods, skills as an extemporaneous speaker and deficiencies with a text, and his inability to adapt to television had push-pull effects on the speechwriting process.

JumboThese difficulties were exacerbated by the President’s eccentricities, such as his habit of intimidating other men by showing off “Jumbo”– his masculine appendage, of which he was inordinately proud. Schlesinger reports that he interviewed speechwriter Douglas Carter by forcing him to join in a skinny dipping session in the White House pool.

The speechwriters serving Johnson lived life on the edge

The pressure was crushing. Waking in the middle of the night, Hardesty would realize that he had been editing a speech in his dreams.

and

A ceaseless week of drafting drove Goodwin to his physical and mental limit in the predawn hours of January 12, the day of delivery. At the end of a thrity-six hour jag, Goodwin could neither focus on his typewriter keys nor order his thoughts in complete sentences.

The root of these difficulties was a simple of case of Presidential envy

Kinter later said that Johnson was “Always angry” about the drafts he was getting. “He always felt they were inferior to Kennedy’s,” he said. “I’ve never known him to be satisfied with a speech, either before, after, or at any point.”

Alas, even Jumbo was no help.

A Conversation with Matt Kivel, Cicero Speechwriting Award Winner

Matt KivelOn Thursday, July 19th the Silicon Valley Speechwriters Roundtable hosted Matt Kivel in a free conference call.

Matt is the overall 2018 Cicero Speechwriting Award Winner for his speech The Power of a Story delivered by Gregory L. Fenves, President, the University of Texas at Austin. This is a searing personal story about the experiences of the President’s father as a Holocaust survivor.

Watch the speech being delivered by President Fenves:

Matt has been writing professionally since 2007. He started as a freelance music critic, and soon became an editor and writer for the entertainment industry bible/trade publication/newspaper Variety, where he interviewed prominent members of the entertainment industry including Warren Beatty, David Lynch, and George Stevens Jr. Later on, he took a job at The Aerospace Corporation and wrote speeches for the company’s President and CEO, Dr. Wanda Austin. He is now the speechwriter to Gregory Fenves, President of The University of Texas.

The call covered a wide range of topics including:

  • His hour-long conversation with Warren Beatty.
  • His career transition from rock n’ roll critic to speechwriter.
  • The process of developing a speech on an intensely personal topic.
  • The audience reaction when the speech was delivered.
  • His favorite Peggy Noonan quote.
  • The upcoming webinar with David Murray on how to win a Cicero Award.
  • And much more…

To hear the full discussion click on the podcast icon below.

Speechwriters speak out in Cambridge

The European Speechwriter Network held their 16th annual conference at King’s College, Cambridge on 12 & 13 April. This 13 minute video features three top speechwriters: Stephen Krupin (speechwriter to Barack Obama), Jessica Cunniffe (speechwriter to David Cameron) and Lindsay Hayes (speechwriter to Sarah Palin). They describe the aptitudes and skills they needed to work at the highest levels. The video includes clips from the conference and is worth viewing in its entirety, if only for the splendid scenes of Cambridge!

Announcing: A Conversation with Cicero Award Winner Matt Kivel

Matt KivelOn Thursday, July 19th the Silicon Valley Speechwriters Roundtable will host Matt Kivel in a free conference call.

Matt is the overall 2018 Cicero Speechwriting Award Winner for his speech The Power of a Story delivered by Gregory L. Fenves, President, the University of Texas at Austin.

Watch the speech being delivered by President Fenves:

The WhoMatt has been writing professionally since 2007. He started as a freelance music critic, and soon became an editor and writer for the entertainment industry bible/trade publication/newspaper Variety, where he interviewed prominent members of the entertainment industry including Warren Beatty, David Lynch, and George Stevens Jr. (Check out his 2013 review of The Who’s Quadrophenia tour!)

Later on, he took a job at The Aerospace Corporation and wrote speeches for the company’s President and CEO, Dr. Wanda Austin. He is now the speechwriter to Gregory Fenves, President of The University of Texas. He enjoys the mosaic-like process of developing strong written material that can strengthen and intensify the bond between speaker and audience. Matt holds a BA in Economics from the University of Michigan.

In this call we’ll discuss the process Matt used to create his award-winning speech and the lessons for all speechwriters as they write the speeches that will be candidates for the 2019 Cicero Awards.

Click here to RSVP for this free conference call.

A Conversation with Bob Sands on Sermons and Speechwriting

Bob Sands On June 19, 2018 the Silicon Valley Speechwriters Roundtable held a conference call with Bob Sands.

Bob is a speaker and speechwriter who has helped people and businesses tailor and tell their stories for the last 25 years. He has also been a Pastor, Entrepreneur, Coach and Radio Broadcaster.

Currently, he is focusing his time on helping individuals, businesses and organizations clarify and communicate their message. As the President of Sands Communications, Inc., he has given over 5000 presentations himself to every kind of group from Funeral directors to firefighters to CEO’s. He has coached and written keynote speeches for executives, helped salespeople hone their speaking skills and developed communication strategies for both political candidates and elected officials.

The call covered a wide range of topics including:

  • Bob’s techniques for crafting a sermon, most often delivered to a familiar audience.
  • The challenge of preaching to congregations where the common themes of the Bible known to earlier generations have been lost.
  • His segue intro speechwriting, and where he finds most of his freelance clients.
  • The relevance of the study of homiletics to speechwriting, especially the books of Alyce McKenzie.
  • Bob’s use of social media to magnify the impact of his message.
  • What impressed him about David Murray’s recent PSA White Paper titled A Provocation from the Pulpit: Dead Preachers Challenge Living Speechwriters.
  • Breaking News: David Murray announcing the creation of a companion to the well-known Vital Speeches of the Day — Vital Sermons of the Day which David and Bob are launching. Find out more on their Facebook page.

To hear these and other topics discussed click on the podcast icon below.