The case against conversational interfaces

This clearly elucidated a number of things I've tried to explain to people who are so excited about "conversations" with computers. The example I've used (with varying levels of effectiveness) was to get someone to think about driving their car by only talking to it. Not a self driving car that does the driving for you, but telling it things like: turn, accelerate, stop, slow down, speed up, put on the blinker, turn off the blinker, etc. It would be annoying and painful and you couldn't talk to your passenger while you were "driving" because that might make the car do something weird. My point, and I think it was the author's as well, is that you aren't "conversing" with your computer, you are making it do what you want. There are simpler, faster, and more effective ways to do that then to talk at it with natural language.

I had the same thoughts on conversational interfaces [1]. Humane AI failed not only because of terrible execution, the whole assumption of voice being a superior interface (and trying to invent something beyond smartphones) was flawed.

> Theoretically, saying, “order an Uber to airport” seems like the easiest way to accomplish the task. But is it? What kind of Uber? UberXL, UberGo? There’s a 1.5x surge pricing. Acceptable? Is the pickup point correct? What would be easier, resolving each of those queries through a computer asking questions, or taking a quick look yourself on the app?

> Another example is food ordering. What would you prefer, going through the menu from tens of restaurants yourself or constantly nudging the AI for the desired option? Technological improvement can only help so much here since users themselves don’t clearly know what they want.

[1]: https://shubhamjain.co/2024/04/16/voice-is-bad-ui/

And 10x worse than that is booking a flight: I found one that fits your budget, but it leaves at midnight, or requires an extra stop, or is on an airline for which you don't collect frequent flyer miles, or arrives it at a secondary airport in the same city, or it only has a middle seat available.

How many of these inconveniences will you put up with? Any of them, all of them? What price difference makes it worthwhile? What if by traveling a day earlier you save enough money to even pay for a hotel...?

All of that is for just 1 flight, what if there are several alternatives? I can't imagine have a dialogue about this with a computer.

But that is how we used to buy a plane ticket. Long before flights.google.com's price table, you'd call a human up and tell them you'd like to go on holiday. They'd ask you where and when and how much you could afford, and then after a while with the old system (SABRE) clicking and clacking they'd find you a good deal. After a few flights with that travel agent, they'd hey to know you and wouldn't have to ask so many questions.

Similarly, long before Waymo, you'd get into a taxi, and tell the human driver you're going to the airport, and they'd take you there. In fact, they'd get annoyed at you if you backseat drove, telling them how to use the blinker and how hard to brake and accelerate.

The thing about conversational interfaces is that we're used to them, because we (well, some of us) interface with other humans fairly regularly, and so it's a fairly baseline level skill to have to exist in the world today. There's a case to be made against them, but since everyone can be assumed to be conversational (though perhaps not in a given language), it's here to stay. Restaurants have menus that customers look at before using the conversation interface to get food, in order to guide the discussion, and that's had thousands of years to evolve, so it might be a local maxima, but it's a pretty good one.