Why Google Duplex might make my design job redundant

A year ago, Google blew the world away with Duplex, an AI assistant that can make phone calls for you. The demo went viral and raised a lot of ethical and philosophical questions.

Last month, Google announced an update for Duplex: it can now use websites for you.

This announcement might not have been as controversial as last year’s, but I believe it is a transformative step towards the future of user interfaces. To understand why, let’s have a quick look back at the history of human-computer interaction (HCI).

From the command line interface to AI

Ever since they were invented, computers have been weird and hard to use. The history of technology have been a constant battle towards making them more human.

Early computers were a nightmare. Their hardware-based input meant you would operate them by cranking a heavy metallic handle, feeding them perforated punch cards or by moving physical switches and cables around. This was extremely tedious and slow.

Credit: Jason Scott
The VT100 video terminal.

In the 1950s, we transitioned to the command line interface. This was the first step towards making computers more human,…

https://thenextweb.com/podium/2019/06/29/google-duplex-gui-ai-design/

Leave a Reply