Boris Johnson - Winston Churchill conversation pioneers live AI interaction
Dubai - Former UK Prime Minister the Rt Hon Boris Johnson conducted a two-way conversation with the former UK Prime Minister the Rt Hon Winston Churchill during the Future of Government Communication Forum at the 2025 World Governments Summit, held in Dubai from the 11th-13th February 2025.
The conversation was recorded at the 'Creator's HQ' during the 'Future of Government Communication Forum', organized by the UAE Government Media Office as part of the World Government Summit 2025, hosted by Dubai from 11 to 13 February 2025. The event was held in collaboration with the Emirati company "AI Media Lab," a subsidiary of Visioneers, which specializes in developing artificial intelligence solutions for key sectors, particularly the media.
The conversation was enabled by a proprietary Large Language Model, an AI trained on Churchill's collected works, speeches and biographies of the former leader, including Johnson's celebrated biography of Churchill, The Churchill Factor: How One Man Made History.
'The model is capable of spine-tingling fidelity, it was a truly uncanny conversation,' said Johnson after the recording. 'Having closely followed and researched Churchill's life, his views and his work, I was amazed to find myself literally face to face with a talking facsimile of Winston who was capable of holding a conversation that one would have said was truly with the man himself. Models like this have a real role in education, in helping people appreciate history in new ways.'
The conversation was the first live demonstration of the first fully interactive meta-human avatar driven by a Large Language Model. It was conducted as a 'Video call with the past', using speech to text to LLM to text to speech technology and a 'meta-human' an emotionally contextual avatar of Churchill, whose synthesised voice was based on samples of Churchill's public speeches. The demonstration paves the way for the development of fully interactive capabilities for artificial intelligence
Over the past 12 years, WGS has become one of the world's largest and most influential forum for governments. The 2025 summit's agenda featured 21 forums covering six key themes including health transformation, governance, and crisis mitigation.
Held under the theme Shaping Future Governments, WGS brought together thought leaders to foster international cooperation and identify innovative solutions for future challenges, ultimately inspiring and empowering the next generation of governments.
In addition to entrepreneurs, several heads of states including the president of Indonesia, Prabhowo Subianto, Sri Lankan president Anura Kumara Disanayake and Kuwaiti prime minister Ahmad Al-Abdullah Al-Sabah attended the event.
The summit also saw the launch of 30 strategic reports across various sectors. These reports, developed in collaboration with leading think tanks and research institutions, offer key indicators, models, and innovative solutions to accelerate progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals, enhance government preparedness and resilience, and foster greater international cooperation.
The summit also presented several prestigious global awards including the Best Minister in the World Award, the Creative Government Innovations Award, the Global Award for Best Government Applications, the Global Government Excellence Award, and the Best Teacher in the World Award.
The summit launched the Global Ministers Survey, inviting ministers worldwide to share their insights on critical global issues and contribute to collaborative solutions. Additionally, it hosted the annual gathering of TIME100's most influential people in AI.
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