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Launch HN: Retell AI (YC W24) – Conversational Speech API for Your LLM

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Re: Launch HN: Retell AI (YC W24) – Conversational Speech API for Your LLM

#71

Post by monkeydust »

101008 wrote: post #60

I would feel deceived if I were a customer of any company or office that uses this. If I take the trouble to call by phone, it's because I want to speak with a person. If I wanted to talk to a machine, I would send an email, talk to a chatbot, or even try to communicate with the company through social media. Calling by phone implies that I am investing time and effort, and I expect the same from the other side.

Its a good point and one the bot industry has not really figured out, forget voice bot but talking about those annoying ones telecom companies throw up. My immediate reaction when I get a bot is to throw in a bunch of garbage to get routed to human as fast as possible. When they get better, perhaps I might change my behaviour.

Re: Launch HN: Retell AI (YC W24) – Conversational Speech API for Your LLM

#72

Post by samstave »

AustinZzx wrote: post #67
samstave wrote: post #56

With respect to Alignment, it should be a fundamental requirement that an speech AI is ___REQUIRED___ to honestly inform a Human if its speaking to an AI. Can you please ensure, going forward, you have the universal "truth" as it were, to have your system always identify if its AI when "prompted" (irrespective of what app/dev has built - your API should ensure that if "safeword" is used it shall reveal its AI) -- "tr…

Good point. Currently, our product does not contain LLM, as we are purely voice API -- instead the developer is bringing in their own LLM solutions and gets to decide what to say. This would be a great guardrail to build in for all sorts of reasons, will see how we can suggest our users adopt it.

May I please understand your arch;

a dev builds an app it | to your API and you spit it back out? - if so - ensure when you spit out whatever it defines itself to whomever is listening....

--

Plz explain the arch of how your system works? (or link me if I missed..)

----

Shortest and most importnat law ever written:

"an AI must identify itself as AI when asked by Humans."

0. Law of robotics.

------

@autsin

-

Cool - so im on an important call with [your customer] your system has an outage?

How is this handled? dropped call?

(I am not being cynical - im being someone who is allergic to post mortems.

----

EDIT: you need to stop using the term "user" in anything you market or describe. full stop.

the reason: in the case of your product, the USER is the motherhecker on the phone listening to anything your CUSTOMER is spewing at them VIA your API.

the USER is who is making IRL *>>>DECISIONS based on what they hear from your system.

Your CUSTOMER is from whom you receive money.

THEIR customer, is whom they get money to pay you.

The USER is the end-point Human. who doesnt even know you exist.

Re: Launch HN: Retell AI (YC W24) – Conversational Speech API for Your LLM

#73

Post by ywj7931 »

101008 wrote: post #60

I would feel deceived if I were a customer of any company or office that uses this. If I take the trouble to call by phone, it's because I want to speak with a person. If I wanted to talk to a machine, I would send an email, talk to a chatbot, or even try to communicate with the company through social media. Calling by phone implies that I am investing time and effort, and I expect the same from the other side.

Personally speaking, when I called the DMV and was asked to wait for 40 minutes, if an AI can help me solve that problem, I wouldn't mind. But I definitely understand that different people have different expectations.

Re: Launch HN: Retell AI (YC W24) – Conversational Speech API for Your LLM

#74

Post by AustinZzx »

samstave wrote: post #72
AustinZzx wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good point. Currently, our product does not contain LLM, as we are purely voice API -- instead the developer is bringing in their own LLM solutions and gets to decide what to say. This would be a great guardrail to build in for all sorts of reasons, will see how we can suggest our users adopt it.

May I please understand your arch; a dev builds an app it | to your API and you spit it back out? - if so - ensure when you spit out whatever it defines itself to whomever is listening.... -- Plz explain the arch of how your system works? (or link me if I missed..) ---- Shortest and most importnat law ever written: "an AI must identify itself as AI when asked by Humans." 0. Law of robotics. ------ @autsin - Cool - so…

We handle the audio bytes in / out, and also connect to your user's server for response. We handle the interaction and decide when to listen and when to talk, and send live updates to our users. When a response is needed, we ask for it and get it from our user.

Our homepage https://www.retellai.com/ has a GIF on it that illustrates this point.

Re: Launch HN: Retell AI (YC W24) – Conversational Speech API for Your LLM

#75

Post by vages »

AustinZzx wrote: post #61
101008 wrote: post #60

I would feel deceived if I were a customer of any company or office that uses this. If I take the trouble to call by phone, it's because I want to speak with a person. If I wanted to talk to a machine, I would send an email, talk to a chatbot, or even try to communicate with the company through social media. Calling by phone implies that I am investing time and effort, and I expect the same from the other side.

Totally understandable that most people would want to chat with a human agent (I sometimes share the same feeling). However, I do think that a major reason for that is voice bots were bad before and could not understand and get things done, and felt like waste of time. With advancements in voice AI and LLM, I'm confident that there would be more use cases where talking to a voice bot is not a bad experience.

No. LLMs are worse for customer experience than their predecessors: LLMs confabulate, and their language is so smooth that you often need expertise to catch them in it.

People call customer service because they don’t know what to do. It would be better for most customers to talk to a bot that they can catch making a mistake.

Recent example: https://bc.ctvnews.ca/air-canada-s-chatbot-gave-a-b-c-man-th...

Re: Launch HN: Retell AI (YC W24) – Conversational Speech API for Your LLM

#77

Post by AustinZzx »

vages wrote: post #75
AustinZzx wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Totally understandable that most people would want to chat with a human agent (I sometimes share the same feeling). However, I do think that a major reason for that is voice bots were bad before and could not understand and get things done, and felt like waste of time. With advancements in voice AI and LLM, I'm confident that there would be more use cases where talking to a voice bot is not a bad experience.

No. LLMs are worse for customer experience than their predecessors: LLMs confabulate, and their language is so smooth that you often need expertise to catch them in it. People call customer service because they don’t know what to do. It would be better for most customers to talk to a bot that they can catch making a mistake. Recent example: https://bc.ctvnews.ca/air-canada-s-chatbot-gave-a-b-c-man-th...

Yes, I agree there are problems with LLM (hallucinations, persona, etc), and that's exciting because that means room for improvement and opportunities. I know many people who are working hard in that field trying to make LLM converse better.

For example - "hallucinations / LLMs confabulate": techniques like RAG can help - "Language is so smooth that you often need the expertise to catch them in it", fine-tuning and prompt engineering can help

Re: Launch HN: Retell AI (YC W24) – Conversational Speech API for Your LLM

#78

Post by Gulipad »

Wow, this is sweet! With a little better latency and less perfection, it'd be well over the uncanny valley (not that it wouldn't fool many people as-is). Are you planning to add more "human" elements like filler words or disfluencies? If anything it feels too perfect to be human. Awesome stuff!

P.S: I tried to fool the Dental Office demo trying to book on Sunday or outside of the slots it had indicated, and it did a better job than many humans would have :)

Re: Launch HN: Retell AI (YC W24) – Conversational Speech API for Your LLM

#80

Post by aik »

101008 wrote: post #60

I would feel deceived if I were a customer of any company or office that uses this. If I take the trouble to call by phone, it's because I want to speak with a person. If I wanted to talk to a machine, I would send an email, talk to a chatbot, or even try to communicate with the company through social media. Calling by phone implies that I am investing time and effort, and I expect the same from the other side.

Completely disagree. You’re not making a phone call in most cases for entertainment purposes. If the options are wait in line for 20 minutes or speak to an actually useful bot, I would take the latter in 100% of cases.
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