Charles Douglass, inventor of the Laugh Track, has died at the age of 93.  Here is an article from sciencenews.org reporting an experiment that laugh tracks didn’t affect an audience watching The Simpsons (perhaps becuase that show is actually funny).  Those results somewhat contradict this study on canned laughter here where canned laughter increased ‘mirth results’ (now there’s a name for a blog).  More on laughter here.