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Chatbots are not the future

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Re: Chatbots are not the future

#81

Post by pharrington »

akiselev wrote: post #60
anonylizard wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? For a writer, if you write out a plot, you can get the AI to actually simulate the character's responses and dialogue (even voiced by AI!). There, you've LITERALLY brought a character to life, each character is driven by a different persona simulated by a different AI, the quality of stories that will create, will annihilate what came before. You want to write an adventure, but want to keep it unpredictable.…

> You want to write an adventure, but want to keep it unpredictable. Ask the AI for ideas, there, the adventure is now a true adventure, not a fake mirage created by the writer. There's something really funny about using an algorithm that predicts the next most likely token to generate unpredictable adventures.

>algorithm that predicts the next most likely token to generate unpredictable adventures

but enough about the human nervous system

Re: Chatbots are not the future

#82

Post by krapp »

jhbadger wrote: post #71
JohnFen wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But is the person using the tool an artist? I think this is an important question. If I give detailed instructions to a human ghost writer about a story I want them to write, I don't think anyone would say that I wrote the story. It was written by the ghost writer. If a piece of art is made by a computer based on detailed instructions, that art was made by a computer, not a person. If you are in the camp that you don…

In the early days of Pixar, some traditionalist animators claimed that Pixar was "cheating" because they used 3D modelling tools rather than physically drawing the frames. The traditionalists didn't see computer animation as a "tool"; they saw it as the computer doing the work of the animator. Were they right? Computers make making things easier. But the human using the computer is the real creator.

Artists using 3d modeling software actually design and create the model, rigging and animation themselves, they don't tell the software "Metal articulated lamp bouncing across wooden table, 3d render, realistic lighting and shadows" and call it a day.

It's a matter of how much control you have over the end product, with AI it's very little. At best, if you want to be charitable, you could describe the role of the person using AI as an art director, but not an artist.

Re: Chatbots are not the future

#83

Post by renewiltord »

JohnFen wrote: post #59
erksa wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the artist that chooses to use AI-tools to generate art-work are in fact artist. For those who are afraid of AI being content generators that puts artist out of work will most likely be disappointed. However the technical gatekeeping some artist do goes away, and it makes room for more people being able to express them self creatively. Art is about the why. We as humans will always ask that question, and we will…

> Digital pixels are not paint brushes. So if you do not move your mouse/brush to generate a stroke? What does it matter? If you are literally explaining every stroke, then it doesn't. But that's not what we're talking about here. We're talking about describing something in pretty general terms and allowing a computer to make the creative decisions (what "brush strokes" to make).

And if you move a horsehair brush, do you determine where each hair lands? If you spray paint, do you say where each drop lands? We have, for long, handed control to physical random processes. To modify that to land on mathematical random processes is not some categorical shift.

Re: Chatbots are not the future

#84

Post by dahwolf »

A lot of people are projecting for ChatGPT to come for the search market, but I wonder how that will play out for lowly cognitive queries.

Quite a few people use search by awkwardly typing on mobile one or two words, probably misspelled and/or auto-completed as they type it. The query isn't sophisticated, lacks a lot of context and parameters, which the search engine then tries to guess.

When you use ChatGPT in that way, you'll get useless generic answers. It seems to shine specifically when being more specific, detailed, which also suggests users are willing and able (education level) to give such rich input.

The idea that it's better than search for this specific normy behavior, I openly question. And let's not forget about the economics. More expensive to run, vastly less ad space, and content owners (the whole web) are going to be pissed and will put up ever higher walls.

Re: Chatbots are not the future

#85

Post by hammyhavoc »

jutrewag wrote: post #80
hammyhavoc wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not in this context of self-expression. Neither are intentional, both are broad strokes. Technologically? Yes, you're right, very different. But in output? It's still generative.

“Intentional” is a weasel word in this context. It means very little in terms of the end result. Humans making art is generative as well even all the way back to cave paintings which were interpretations of animals in nature.

No, it isn't. Do you really think Alfred Hitchcock would leave his film up to others, let alone a machine? No. It wasn't his vision, thus it wasn't his self-expressive intent. Read about auteur theory.

That's not what generative art is, mate. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generative_art

Re: Chatbots are not the future

#86

Post by JusticeJuice »

skybrian wrote: post #62

Learning how to use freeform text input can be pretty annoying when only a few things work. Some examples are playing a text adventure ("guess the verb") and using an unfamiliar command line interface. Good error messages can help. Web search changed that. Most queries work, at least somewhat. There's a point where freeform text input becomes better than structured input. A simple search box is what people mostly use…

Yeah, exactly. A freeform input promises it can do 'anything at all' but if it can't in reality, it's always a frustrating interface.

Classic example, Siri. It's so easy to quickly find stuff you feel like it should be able to do, but it just can't. "When was my last message from Steve" etc.

Re: Chatbots are not the future

#87

Post by itake »

phillipcarter wrote: post #33
itake wrote: post #5

> Good tools make it clear how they should be used. This is such a weird statement from someone in the tech space. Programming languages rarely have an opinion for how they are to be used (for example JS MUST only run the browser or which code style to use). When I chat with customer support, I wish they could meet me where I am instead of me needing to learn their tools. For example, I want to say "cancel my subscri…

> Programming languages rarely have an opinion for how they are to be used Erm, they absolutely have an opinion. That's why I can't just write however I like in whatever language. I need to stick to the designer's opinions on syntax and semantics otherwise it won't work.

When chatting with a Chatbot, you also would need to stick with the language's syntax and semantics otherwise it won't work. You can't just write however and whatever you want and expect the bot to understand you.

Re: Chatbots are not the future

#89

Post by bigyikes »

dahwolf wrote: post #84

A lot of people are projecting for ChatGPT to come for the search market, but I wonder how that will play out for lowly cognitive queries. Quite a few people use search by awkwardly typing on mobile one or two words, probably misspelled and/or auto-completed as they type it. The query isn't sophisticated, lacks a lot of context and parameters, which the search engine then tries to guess. When you use ChatGPT in that…

Just wait until we have a model that automatically translates vague, awkward prompts into something more useful.

Put differently: if Google’s search models already have the ability to return great results for poor queries, why couldn’t a large language model (or a plug-in for one) learn the same algorithm?

Re: Chatbots are not the future

#90

Post by sitkack »

kmtrowbr wrote: post #67
alanbernstein wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the point is that a "chatbot" is, by (the author's) definition, a UI with only a bare text prompt. Once you start building more UI on top of that, you're ... doing what the article suggests.

I see -- my apologies I must not have read it closely enough! :blush:

I re-read the post. The author is arguing against a statement that no one made and then uses the rest of the essay to outline their work. It is a bit of a setup.

An LLM-Chatbot is an extremely flexible tool, but I haven't seen anyone argue that all of our UIs and applications should be replaced by chat. That is ridiculous.

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