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Ask HN: Is anyone unimpressed by most chatbots?

3 points by AznHisoka ↗ HN
I go to a corporate website, even the ones that sell chatbots themselves, like Salesforce and Sprinklr, and ask them a basic question about their product, and their chatbot just simply gives the wrong answer.

Meanwhile, I do a simple Google search and I see the answer right there in one of their help docs.

How am I supposed to have any confidence in using these chat bots, when the chatbot can't even answer simple questions about their own product?

And lastly, why are thousands of people enamored and hyped about this technology at conferences, etc? Sure, it's useful, but the implementation currently leaves a lot to be desired...

4 comments

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duxup
It feels like chatbots are a required element to have at some point. Someone decides they have to have one. I wonder if they actually track if people use them / solve anything with them.

The only time they've ever "worked" for me was on Amazon.com but even that exchange / request for a refund could have been done with a form... I don't think it did anymore work than that.

extragalaxial
ChatGPT started replacing Google and StackExchange sites for me. Sometimes when GPT gets confused by some math questions I ask Claude and vice versa.
pkoird
While I do consider Chatbots to be the low-hanging fruit of LLM research, I think the hype is partially justified by the fact that they weren't this good even 2-3 years ago. If you are willing to forgive their current status in face of the progress made, you should be able to see what they may hold in your five year future.