
The new breed of chatbot talks more like a human, but that is not always good - IntronExon
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/02/21/technology/conversational-bots.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Ftechnology
======
userbinator
"Let's stupidify a machine that can easily give you exact answers with all the
impreciseness and ambiguity of human language."

That basically sums up what I think of these things. They're a horrible
substitute for existing UI, and even worse for things that really require a
_real_ human.

~~~
gm-conspiracy
I also think that current gen. of UI (touchscreens flat-design) has become
such a degraded experience that these alternatives become more appealing.

~~~
vladbarash
Could you please elaborate on the degraded experience?

~~~
leetcrew
idk OP's position, but the lack of tactile feedback is probably the biggest
flaw of touchscreen UIs. it's really nice to be able to give input to a device
without actually looking at it.

it's a mild to moderate inconvenience on a phone, since you are looking at the
screen most of the time you are using it and swype style keyboards remove most
of the pain of typing on a virtual keyboard. it does make for a compromised
music player, though, unless you can remap the hardware buttons to control
media playback.

on the other hand, i find the touch UI trend in cars absolutely horrible. it's
bad enough that you have to take your eyes off the road to read the center
screen, but actually pressing a virtual button requires even more
concentration to track where your finger is wrt the button and stabilize it
against the motion of the vehicle.

------
truculation
Heh. We're developing code that can impersonate the average human better than
the average human. Well that about wraps it up for the Turing Test.

------
oculusthrift
Someone needs to tell the author that Microsoft isn’t headquartered in Silicon
Valley.

~~~
cooper12
It's case of
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metonymy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metonymy).
Silicon Valley is no longer just a physical place, but also represents the
tech industry itself in popular imagination. Also, while the article is
centered on Microsoft, I think the title is meant to be general, as shown by
this passage:

> The project represents a much wider effort to build a new breed of computing
> system that is truly conversational. At companies like Facebook, Amazon, and
> Salesforce as well as Microsoft...

~~~
kurthr
I was going to just brush this off as silly, but then thought of all the
NewYork things that you see around (NY Bagels, NY Fashion, etc) and realize
they suffer at least as much... so I can almost forgive the NYT.

------
Harrisonbans
Well, I think chatbots are good for marketers and online sales companies.

~~~
paulie_a
I think it is junk technology for consumers/anyone that has to interact with
them

~~~
bitL
Paradoxically it's the future of customer support and what we are observing is
an early stage. A few tweaks and semantic advances in deep learning here and
there, and a regular person would be happy to interact with them for stuff
like getting more info about their order, specs and availability of the
product etc.

~~~
cimmanom
The problem is when you have a question slightly more complex than that and no
access to a real human being. I recently enjoyed that situation with a medical
benefit provider's phone menus, and it was infuriating. (Still haven't figured
out how to get a human being on the phone and am waiting, 2 weeks later, for
an answer to an email.)

~~~
cm2187
That being said "computer says no" is often a standard answer when you call a
call center. They may be humans but if their guide doesn't have the answer to
the question you are out of luck.

~~~
cimmanom
Sure, but a lot of times you have an open ended question or problem. Or need
to ask about something undocumented.

Here are some questions I couldn't get bots to answer for me recently:

"This printed form you provided me for a regulated action requires an account
number, but no account number is displayed anywhere on your website or
statements or any communications I've had from you. Where do I find that
information?"

"Your site took money out of my account, said it couldn't complete the
transaction, and now refuses to return the money to my account. How can I fix
this and either get my money back or get what I paid for?"

And sometimes it takes a human to answer "is it still the case that the answer
is 'no' if these other unusual circumstances apply?"

