I guess I tend to think of it as casual chatting in line at the grocery store (no names exchanged and you’ll either never see each other again or not remember each other if you do) or actually introducing yourselves and planning to keep in touch or at least recognize each other around town to speak again.
The automation only ever does the former. While I wouldn’t want it to put every single passing townie into the relationship panel, I can see how it might make sense that if the conversation lasts longer than x amount of time, or happens with an invited guest at a party hosted at your home lot, you might want it to progress to the latter.
The problem with that is that the "Goodbye" interaction is only available if you've introduced yourself to them, so it's difficult to get sims you don't want to talk to out of the conversation without adding them to your relationship panel. I just want to be able to say "Goodbye" to random townies that join conversations so they butt out. I shouldn't need to first introduce myself just to tell them to mind their own business. lol
