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What Julie Zhuo thinks about chat interfaces

@julie-zhuo · 37 positions · 0 changes of mind

Co-founder of Sundial; former vice president of product design at Facebook; author of The Making of a Manager; writes The Looking Glass.

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Julie Zhuo did not write this page.

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3 dated positions, 2025, in their own words. Our reading of what Julie Zhuo has said — not written or endorsed by them.

3 positions so far — this page is not yet offered to search engines.

  1. Our readingChatGPT exploded because of its obvious chat interface, not its technology, which had launched earlier in a different wrapper that few noticed.

    Their wordsThe technology powering ChatGPT had already launched prior to November 30th, 2022. It was just wrapped in a different interface. Very few people paid attention. Why did ChatGPT explode in popularity? Because of its obvious chat interface, which everyone intuitively already knew how to use it.

    ↗Conversational Interfaces: the Good, the Ugly & the Billion-Dollar Opportunitylg.substack.com

    OpenAI

    Interesting

  3. Our readingA blank chat box is lazy: it violates the first rule of a good user experience, that it is obvious what you can do.

    Their wordsThe problem with a blank chat box on a blank page is that it violates the first rule of a high-quality user experience: it isn’t obvious what I can do.

    ↗Conversational Interfaces: the Good, the Ugly & the Billion-Dollar Opportunitylg.substack.com

    design

    Interesting

  5. Our readingConversational interfaces get to the first seventy percent quickly and are bad at iteration; the future is chat married to traditional direct-manipulation controls.

    Their wordsConversational UIs are great at quickly getting to the first 70%, but suck at offering easy controls over narrower areas for iteration.

    ↗Conversational Interfaces: the Good, the Ugly & the Billion-Dollar Opportunitylg.substack.com

    Interesting