James Patterson will preview his next novel in Facebook Messenger

James Patterson, the best-selling book factory in human form, is letting readers interact with the characters from his upcoming novel The Chef by speaking to them through Facebook Messenger. Starting October 30th, you'll be able to receive video and...

Google-backed startup’s chat bots turn ads into conversations

AdLingo, a marketing platform fresh out of Google's Area 120 incubator program, is making advertisements "conversational" with the help of AI. AdLingo doesn't build its own chatbots, but instead connects third-party chatbot tools with a company's mar...

Facebook tries giving chatbots a consistent personality

Dig into the personalities of chat bots and you'll find that they're about as shallow as they were in the days of Eliza or Dr. Sbaitso. They respond with canned phrases and tend to be blithely unaware of what you've said. Facebook wants to fix that....

Microsoft’s Cortana finds answers inside your Skype chats

You can already count on a dash of AI assistance in some mobile messaging apps, whether it's Google Assistant in Allo or the smart replies you find across iOS. But what if Skype is your chat app of choice? You're covered: as of today, Microsoft is ro...