Get ready for the whisper-filled office of the future

How will work settings change as we spend more and more time talking to our computers? A recent feature in the Wall Street Journal looks at the increasing popularity of dictation apps like Wispr, especially now that they can be linked to vibe coding tools, and what that could mean for office etiquette.

One VC said visiting startup offices now feels like walking into a high-end call center. And Gusto co-founder Edward Kim is apparently telling his team that offices will “sound more like a sales floor” in the future. (As someone who is still scarred from the time their desk was briefly moved to a sales floor, let me say, oh no.)

Kim claimed that he now only types when he absolutely has to. But he admitted that constant dictation in the office can be “just a bit of a pain.”

Similarly, AI entrepreneur Mollie Amkraut Mueller said her husband became irritated by her new habit of whispering to her computer, so their late work sessions now involve sitting apart, or “one of us stays in our office.”

But Wispr founder Tanay Kothari emphasized that one day this will all seem “normal,” just as it has become normal to stare at your phone for hours.