The Humor Genome Project — Founding Researcher / Contributor (Equity or Side Project)

AI can write code, stories, even songs. But it still can't make us laugh in a natural way. We're changing that.

The Humor Genome Project is the first large-scale effort to map the structure of humor. By collecting, annotating, and organizing jokes, performances, and cross-cultural humor, we aim to create the benchmarks and taxonomies that make humor computationally tractable. Think ImageNet for comedy.

We're building a founding community of researchers, comedians, and engineers who want to explore this frontier. Depending on your interest, that could mean:

• Co-founder track: lead research and technical vision (equity-based, pre-funding)
• Serious contributor: ~10–15 hrs/week on core dataset + discussions (equity milestones)
• Side project collaborator: a few hrs/week, joining discussions, experiments, or annotation jams (community recognition)

You might be a fit if you:

• Think at the intersection of computational linguistics, humor theory, and culture
• Have experience in NLP / LLM research, comedy/performance, or large-scale data projects
• Enjoy discussing and defining frameworks, benchmarks, and taxonomies
• Want to help shape a new field, not just a product

What's in it for you:

• Equity and authorship opportunities for core contributors (note: pre-funding, no salaries yet)
• Visibility as an early pioneer in AI + humor
• A seat at the table as we define how machines understand comedy

If this sparks your interest, send me a note on LinkedIn or at michi@humorgenome.org. Links to papers, repos, or performances are very welcome.

Let's map the humor genome — and teach AI how to laugh.