After having spent a few years working on a chatbot, the allure is this: talking to a real human is better than filling out a form. If we can build a Q&A system as good as talking to a human, people would also prefer it to filling out forms. So that's the pursuit.

I understand the hate, because we haven't landed very close that goal yet, and the intermediate product is much worse than a form. But I am surprised that a technical community is not more supportive of the ambition.