Exploring the Future of Background Agents: Solving Issues with Chat-Based Interfaces

Discover how documents can revolutionize chat-based interfaces by providing forced clarity, version control, and logical grouping, paving the way for a future where AI-powered 'background agents' do tasks for us.

  • 1. Philip is the CEO of Wordware and discussed the problems with chat-based interfaces and how documents can solve those issues.
  • 2. Chat-based systems have several issues, such as:
  • * Creating workflows using copy-pasting and projects
  • * Context pollution due to irrelevant information in the context window
  • * Lack of structured iteration when working with artifacts
  • * Forced clarity not being provided by AI like ChatGPT
  • * Poor version control, limited reusability model, laziness, and reduced quality responses as the context grows
  • * No support for logical grouping or nesting
  • * Interaction with a single abstraction layer without the option to specify details
  • 3. Documents are an effective way to address these problems because:
  • * They have been used for centuries to explain complex systems
  • * They force clarity and structured communication
  • * Humans communicate more effectively using documents than chat-based interfaces
  • 4. Chat interfaces have limitations, such as concurrency of one, where the user must wait for responses without performing other tasks.
  • 5. Background agents can help by running processes in the background, providing a better user experience.
  • 6. The evolution of workflows and background agents includes:
  • * Handcrafted workflows with high importance and occurrence
  • * General agents making decisions based on if-else statements
  • * Human intervention in the loop to approve, reject, or modify agent output
  • 7. Background agents have implications for both consumers and organizations:
  • * Organizations will need to manage agents, permissions, and authority
  • * Humans will be responsible for managing agents and their actions
  • * More communication protocols between humans and AI, as well as between agents, are required
  • 8. The future of agent economy includes:
  • * A stoic mindset, accepting uncertainty and minimizing the impact of rare catastrophic events
  • * Humans managing multiple agents with taste and intent imbued into them
  • 9. When using agents, it's important to:
  • * Start by addressing repeatable processes first
  • * Hook up these processes to triggers (chron job, Gmail trigger, implicit triggers)
  • * Review agent results and approve or edit them as needed
  • 10. The consumer market will adopt this technology more widely in the future, leading to its entry into the enterprise market.

Source: AI Engineer via YouTube

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