Comment by wbobeirne
2 years ago
> With this new UI paradigm, represented by current generative AI, the user tells the computer the desired result but does not specify how this outcome should be accomplished.
This doesn't seem like a whole new paradigm, we already do that. When I hit the "add comment" button below, I'm not specifically instructing the web server how I want my comment inserted into a database (if it even is a database at all.) This is just another abstraction on top of an already very tall layer of abstractions. Whether it's AI under the hood, or a million monkeys with a million typewriters, it doesn't change my interaction at all.
I think the important part from the article that establishes the difference is this:
> As I mentioned, in command-based interactions, the user issues commands to the computer one at a time, gradually producing the desired result (if the design has sufficient usability to allow people to understand what commands to issue at each step). The computer is fully obedient and does exactly what it’s told. The downside is that low usability often causes users to issue commands that do something different than what the users really want.
Let's say you're creating a new picture from nothing in Photoshop. You will have to build up your image layer by layer, piece by piece, command by command. Generative AI does the same in one stroke.
Something similar holds for your comment: you had to navigate your browser (or app) to the comment section of this article, enter your comment, and click "add comment". With an AI system with good usability you could presumably enter "write the following comment under this article on HN: ...", and have your comment be posted.
The difference lies on the axis of "power of individual commands".
With a proper AI system you don’t even need to specify the exact article and nature of the comment.
For example here’s the prompt I use to generate all my HN comments:
“The purpose of this task is to subtly promote my professional brand and gain karma points on Hacker News. Based on what you know about my personal history and my obsessions and limitations, write comments on all HN front page articles where you believe upvotes can be maximized. Make sure to insert enough factual errors and awkward personal details to maintain plausibility. Report back when you’ve reached 50k karma.”
Working fine on GPT-5 so far. My… I mean, its 8M context window surely helps to keep the comments consistent.
Hey, that's cheating!
(I'm stuck with GPT-4 8k, still waiting for 32k API access. But one has to make due with what they have.)
As the parent comment says, it's just another abstraction level. You have chosen a granularity, but even with "going to a website, enter your comment and click add comment" you are abstracting a lot. You are nto caring about connecting to a server, authentication, etc. The final user doesn't care about that at all, it's just telling the software to post a comment.
Right now the granularity may be "Comment on Hacker News article about UI this and this and that...", and in 100 years someone will say "But that's too complicated. You need to tell the IA which article to comment and what, while my new IA just guess it from reading my mind..."
I guess you could also argue that telling another person 17 tasks to do is just another abstraction level. That doesn't change that it's a completely different interaction paradigm than the ones before.
> Generative AI does the same in one stroke.
But it isn’t creating what I had in mind, or envisioned, if you will.
It might not be exactly what you envisioned, but that's where the difference comes in: with a batch processing system, you generate something over night with one input. With command processing systems you generate something with dozens or hundreds of individual commands, and it might still not be what you want.
With AI systems you generate something with one action, allowing you much faster iteration loops. Remember, the author argues that the current prompting still has bad usability. Presumably a system with good usability could allow you to generate what you want with one, or a couple, of attempts.
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If I had a spectrum of purely imperative on one side and purely declarative on the other, these new AIs are much closer to the latter than anything that has come before them.
SQL errors if you don’t write in very specific language. These new AIs will accept anything and give it their best shot.
But that's just a change in valid input cardinality at the cost of precision.
Yeah I would agree with this, the article struggles really classifying the different paradigms, and due to this the conclusion winds up not holding true. We're still relying on "batch processing".
Ok, now let's tackle a slightly tricker UI.
Let's assume someone hasn't used Blender before.
"Draw me a realistic looking doughnut, with a shiny top and pink sprinkles"
Vs.
2 hour video tutorial to tell you what do 50 or so individual steps using the 2nd paradigm UI. Then clicking all the buttons.
-- Admittedly, the AI approach robs you of understanding of how the sausage (sorry doughnut) is made.
Rebuttal: Doughnut macro
Rebuttal Rebuttal: AI can construct things where a macro doesn't yet exist.
In the future it’ll likely be that doing it manually will be considered specialty work. This is already the case with much of programming — as you’d bring in a higher level engineer to do something like tear into the source code of SDKs and monkey with them.
For something as “simple” as a doughnut, this will just improve the learning curve and let you learn some things a bit later, just like today you can jump into beginner JS without knowing any programming fundamentals
Mere abstraction a bit different because with say JS you need to learn a skill. It is not easy for a non programmer to do well. Takes a lot of hours. Now or soon they will be telling the computer what they want for simple things. Userspace for non programmers is going to expand greatly.
The difference is one is an assistant and the other is a tool. Essentially a tool, has one function. The outcome of all inputs is clear, once you learn the tool. An assistant, behaves different in different environment, it anticipates and interprets. It may not be deterministic. It's easier to use but harder (or impossible) to understand.
For example, the lasso selection in Photoshop is clearly a tool. A "content aware" selection on the other hand is an assistant.
Under the new UI paradigm the ad comment button would let you submit something like “I disagree with this, provide a three paragraph argument that cites X and Y refuting this claim” and it would write the text for you.
Why bother with the micromanagement? "Computer, waste time commenting on Hacker News for three hours."
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