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We discuss current approaches to the development of natural language dialogue systems, and claim that they do not sufficiently consider the unique qualities of man-machine interaction as distinct from general human discourse. We conclude that empirical studies of this unique communication situation is required for the development of user-friendly interactive systems. One way of achieving this is through the use of so-called Wizard of Oz studies. We describe our work in this area. The focus is on the practical execution of the studies and the methodological conclusions that we have drawn on the basis of our experience. While the focus is on natural language interfaces, the methods used and the conclusions drawn from the results obtained are of relevance also to other kinds of intelligent interfaces. 1 THE NEED FOR WIZARD OF OZ STUDIES Dialogue has been an active research area for quite some time in natural language processing. It is fair to say that researchers studying dialogue and discourse have developed their theories through detailed analysis of empirical data from many diverse dialogue situations. In their recent review of the field, Grosz, Pollack and Sidner 12 mentions work on task-oriented dialogues, descriptions of complex objects, narratives, informal and formal arguments, negotiations and explanations. One thing which these studies have shown is that human dialogue is a very com-