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Course · Shipping AI interfaces
Streaming, done honestly
A streaming reveal is the most iconic AI motion and the easiest to fake. The honest version announces what it is, stops for reduced motion, and never lets the stream obscure the content.
Beginner1 min read (computed · recorded 3)updated 2026-09-14aistreamingmotioncourse
by Motif Editors
revised 2026-09-14 — First publication in the bank-4 AI-interface curriculum.
— A stream has a contract: it reveals, it does not obfuscate — the text is readable at any pause point.
— Reduced motion collapses the reveal to a fade, never to an empty box.
— If the demo does not stream, say so; a fake stream is a fake product.
The stream is a contract
A streaming reveal promises one thing: the text is arriving now, and it will keep arriving. Break that contract by revealing a sentence that changes meaning mid-way, and the reader learns not to trust the display. The honest stream is a fixed transcript revealed at a steady pace — what you see is what is coming, no rewrites.
Reduced motion is a fade, not a blank
The site-wide rule collapses the reveal for readers who asked for less motion. The collapse must land on a fully formed paragraph, not an empty box waiting to fill — a static reader never sees less content, only less movement. A caret that blinks for the whole sentence is decoration; a caret that blinks forever is a bug.
And the demo itself must say what it is. A local interval over a fixed transcript is an honest demo; a pretend network call is not.