
About Misbehaving Machines
The AI in the library project aims to develop innovative AI literacy programmes for Australian librarians and library clients to understand the benefits and risks of using popular generative AI applications such as ChatGPT to discover accurate information about the world. The first output of the project was The Making of Misbehaving Machines exhibit. This exhibit demonstrates a chatbot that answers questions in unexpected ways. The group built the chatbot by developing a dataset of questions - from quotidian to unanswerable - and a set of prompts ranked according to their level of misbehaviour. Visitors could learn about how the chatbot was made through three simple steps. They could also ask what question they would like to ask of the misbehaving machines and to rate its answerability and absurdity.
The Making of Misbehaving Machines was exhibited at Green Square, Parramatta City, TAFE NSW Ultimo and UTS libraries in November 2024. Plans are afoot to update the materials for further exhibits in 2025 and to publish the materials we used for the collaborative development of the exhibit with librarians.
The AI in the Library project is a collaboration between researchers from the University of Technology Sydney (UTS), the New South Wales Public Libraries Association (NSWPLA), the State Library of NSW and pilot libraries from Greater Sydney (Parramatta City Libraries, Sydney City Libraries, TAFE NSW and UTS).
Pilot Funding in 2024 was from the University of Technology Sydney.
Find out more about what and why here...
And find out what questions you have been asking the machines here...

Making our datasets
Find out how we made our first datasets for the Misbehaving Machines
find out how!

Group Members

is an ARC Fellow and Associate Professor in the School of Communications.

is Associate Professor, Digital Social Media in the School of Communication.

is a Senior Lecturer in Digital and Social Media in the School of Communication.

is a senior lecturer is Visual Communication, School of Design

is a lecturer is Visual Communication, School of Design
Research and Co-Design Participants
Trish Hepworth
City of Sydney Libraries
Heather Davis
Fiona Ni
David Dolan
Kathryn Joss
TAFE NSW
Emma Stockburn
Naomi Burns
Heidi Wills
Anna Sin
Emma Stockburn
Nisa Alam
UTS Library
Nicole Aradas
Kimberley Porteous
Alycia Bailey
Ashley England
Emma Slee
State Library of NSW
Abby Dawson
Our Institutional Partners


New South Wales Public Libraries Association

Our Participating Libraries



