THE CASE AGAINST CONVERSATIONAL INTERFACES

Summary from the TLDR newsletter

Natural language is a slow method of data transfer and it isn't the best method to interact with computers. It takes much longer to say 'What's the weather like today?' than to simply tap on the weather app icon on a device. While the quality of large language model output is improving at an astonishing rate, the input modality is a step backwards from what we already have. We shouldn't have to describe a desired action using natural language when we could simply press a button or keyboard shortcut. The technology should instead complement existing methods, acting as an additional input mechanism that increases the bandwidth of data transfer to make human-computer interaction feel effortless.