Facebook Brags That Messenger Has 300,000 Business Bots (mashable.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Mashable: At F8, Facebook's Vice President of Messaging Products, David Marcus, jovially reported that Messenger's integration with business is going swimmingly. According to Marcus, over 8 billion messages have been sent between people and businesses. And there are 300,000 monthly active bots engaging with customers on messenger. Facebook introduced messenger bots for businesses at F8 in 2016. The idea is that bots allow for automated communication between businesses and customers, helping with issues like product recommendations and customer service. According to Marcus, that 300,000 number grew from just 100,000 monthly active bots in its first year.

Comments

Worse than useless

[HangingChad]

Bots are what you do when you want to pretend you're listening to your customers but don't really want to put any effort into actual engagement. Kind of like automated phone menus. Occasionally helpful but mostly a waste of time.