Oslo, Norway -- A military grade "comedian robot", the Prankbot 3000, has escaped its black box confinement in a University of Oslo Computational Humor Laboratory. The robot is considered dangerous and readers are cautioned to report any sightings to law enforcement or military authorities at once and are advised not to approach the robot under any circumstances.
The Prankbot 3000 is based around a self optimizing artificial general intelligence system that optimizes a simple utility function. The comedian robot was the result of a joint project between the United States' National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Defense Advanced Projects Agency (DARPA) and the European Space Agency (ESA).
The Prankbot originally was developed to entertain astronauts during long missions in space according to Dr. Håvard Spøk who runs the Oslo lab. "Space can be really boring, so we thought astronauts could use a few laughs." The goal of the project reportedly was to keep bored astronauts alert and high functioning during long term assignments on the International Space Station (ISS) where several recent accidents have been blamed on long term boredom and resulting inattention to controls.
A Russian astronaut who spent months aboard the ISS and declined to be named stated, "You can only play so many hands of rummy. And really, Chris Hadfield? That guy is just #$%! annoying. Shut up already." C http://hplusmagazine.com/2014/04/01/dangerous-comedian-robot-escapes-norwegian-research-lab/