Context
I’m trying out Spiral firstly to try write a blog post about prompting techniques, and then write a friction log for this friction log (very meta).
Suggestions for improvement
- Add quick-start templates for new users → Public spirals could be the default just for new users
- Better clarity on template use that it doesn’t learn your voice, perhaps by highlighting the maker that made it so it’s clear it’s someone else’s voice
- Reduce friction on adding examples. Some ideas (ordered by work needed):
- Small tool to search for examples—this is also a good place to show taste in great writing/writers
- Preloaded sample examples in a walkthrough
- Quick explainer tooltip on how many work best
- Make it clearer how to see full generated text
- Clarify the impact of actions on the number of available "spirals"
- Add tooltips or help text for unclear features
- [nit] Fix typos in onboarding email
Areas explored
Sign-up and onboarding
✅ Google account login was simple and straightforward
🟨 Dashboard is clear but lacks immediate guidance
- No templates available for quick start
- Had to check email for onboarding information
🛑 Onboarding email had a typo
- "Hi there!" used both exclamation mark and period
Templates and AI output
🟨 When using a template, especially at first, unclear that AI-generated content wouldn’t have matched user's voice as advertised
- Tone immediately recognizable as AI-like
- Unclear how to provide more direction or prompts
Creating a Spiral from scratch
✅ Being able to provide examples was helpful
🟨 Interface for adding notes is straightforward but lacks clarity
- The upside is unclear for adding more examples—how many is optimal? I’ve also tried so many that didn’t work, that there’s some friction in actually going to find a good example.
- Wasn't sure about the difference between "generate multiple" and "run"
🛑 Text output experience was confusing
- Initial output cut off, causing confusion
- Had to discover "show" button to see full text
Using a Spiral
✅ Interface for inputting examples and style patterns is clear
✅ Good extraction into prompt, replicates the examples well
✅ Ability to edit voice, tone, personality, style, and structure
🟨 Uncertainty about using up available "spirals"
- Not clear if clicking "spiral" uses up one of the limited runs
Overall UI/UX
✅ Clear interface for examples and style patterns
🟨 Some features lack explanation (e.g., "generate multiple" vs "run")
🛑 Anxiety-inducing uncertainty about using up limited "spirals” when setting up spiral
Stream of consciousness
I am brand-new to Spiral. I'm trying to sign up now and that's pretty simple. I've logged in with my Google account easily.
Cool, now in the dashboard and it says I have no spirals yet. Create a spiral. It would be quite nice at this point if there was a template that I could use just to get started quickly from a blank page. Maybe let me check my email and see if there is an onboarding email.
I've now got an onboarding email. Small nit, looks like there's a typo - it says "hi there" but with both an exclamation mark and comma. The example URLs are pretty cool so what looks relevant might be notes to a "captivating post", so that's where I'm gonna try it out. Click on it.
I'm going to add in my notes from an article that I was writing on engineering techniques. They are very rough thoughts and I don't actually have the structure, so I'm just gonna dump all these notes. I do have a structure in mind which is kind of an introduction on what techniques have been tried before and structuring them into psychology-based ideas, but let's see what this tool will take us. So there is "generate multiple" and "run". Not quite sure what that means so I'll just go for "run". Cool, that took me 30 to 45 seconds. Let's see what we got. The first thing is that it cuts off and I was a bit confused as to where the rest of my text goes. Is this locked somehow because I’m on a trial? Oh, okay, there is a "show" button, so let me click here. It looks fairly AI-like, I can immediately tell. And what I was hoping to get from this was a way to channel my voice, which was part of the pitch of the product. I'm not sure I can add more prompts or more direction on this, so I am slightly confused. Maybe I should poke around a bit more on the app page.
Okay, I'm actually going to try writing a fiction log with Spiral, so maybe try that next. I press "Spiral" and an input format, so yeah, notes and format and friction log with the headings and prompts. Okay, this is where it provides examples with transferring your voice. Cool, so I'll give it some output. I don't actually have a friction log on hand as the example, so let me put a couple in from someone else.
It's very clear, the interface to add examples and it's clear what is actually happening with the different patterns. Now I can kind of edit this extracted format, which is cool - it’s kind of like ChatGPT’s memories… voice, tone, personality, style, structure. Cool, let's try this Spiral. What isn't so clear here, which I already realize, is that if I click "Spiral", does that use up my number of spirals left? Because I already ran a spiral, and it was clear, but here it can cause a little bit of anxiety, so I didn't do it. Let's go ahead and run it. I'll put in my notes up to here.
Wow, that was really fast and the template and extraction is really good. I really like how it's set up and was able to follow the formula with just two examples that provided. Granted, it was a very structured example that provided, but would love to see how this works with more subtle and nuanced voice.