Chapter 15. Verbal Dialogue Marking
A dialogue marker is a word or a phrase that plays a role in managing the flow and structure of a dialogue. Examples of dialogue markers are: “Let’s start,” “First,” “Next,” “By the way,” and “Anyway.”
One of the driving tenets of this book is that a voicebot should never pretend to possess human sensibilities. It should never behave in such a way that it somehow tricks the human into thinking the voicebot has feelings. It should not emulate human behavior to such an extent that the human would suspend disbelief, even briefly (in that they would begin to say things they normally wouldn’t do if they had remained aware that they were engaging with a voicebot). And why is this important? It is important because this machine is not a creatio ex nihilo (creation out of nothing). The voicebot was created by an entity (for instance, a giant tech company) and may not necessarily be looking out for the best interest of the user. For instance, a data-hungry corporation could successfully get the human user to trust the voicebot enough to provide that voicebot with sensitive information just because the voicebot was impeccably polite or endearingly flattering.
By the same token, a voicebot does not need to go to the other extreme and behave so robotically that the behavior gets in the way of an effective dialogue.
Take the following exchange:
VOICEBOT: How old are you?
USER: Twenty-four.
VOICEBOT: Are you male or female?
USER: Female.
VOICEBOT: What’s ...
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