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"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.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think it is junk technology for consumers/anyone that has to interact with them
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.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
Why can’t these things be shown through the UI?
"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.
It is basically a boring re-implementation of search, except that for many big companies it has the side effect of causing them to work harder to make their search actually work well. Even if the UI ends up being poor or temporary, the investments in better knowledge management and search ranking internally ends up being a net benefit.
Source: have seen behind the scenes at some larger outsourcers supporting these kinds of chatbots for customer service bots.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
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.)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.)
Yes, that's a major flaw in their customer support. Still, in the near future most common tasks can be handled by AI and only specific ones forwarded to humans (until those can be automated away as well).
Someone needs to tell the author that Microsoft isn’t headquartered in Silicon Valley.
> 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...
"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.
I also think that current gen. of UI (touchscreens flat-design) has become such a degraded experience that these alternatives become more appealing.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
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.)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.)
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.
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?"