Apps are dying. Long live the subservient bots ready to fulfil your every desire

Some interesting info on new types of interaction processes



Apps are dying. Long live the subservient bots ready to fulfil your every desire: In October 2009, Apple launched in-app purchases for the App Store. The software industry hasn't looked back. In the second half of 2013 alone, Candy Crush Saga made $1.04 billion from microtransactions. More recently, Pok�mon GO, Niantic's runaway-success game, made $35 million from in-app purchases in two weeks. According to analysts IDC, revenue from mobile apps, not including advertising, was around $34.2 billion in 2015. For bots, the opportunity could be even greater. "Bots have emerged as a high-potential channel of distribution for mobile services," says Guo. Not only do messaging apps have a captive audience, the cost of developing bots is lower than for apps. "The progression from trivial to sophisticated is going to happen faster," says Underwood. "App developers have been able to learn from the introduction of prior interfaces because it wasn't long ago that mobile apps came on the scene. It took a few years in mobile. With bots I think it will happen in half the time." Libin, one of the bot industry's leading investors, has no doubts about its transformative potential. "There are going to be 100 million bots. It's going to be similar to the app gold-rush, but magnified," he says. As with apps, the vast majority of bots will be pointless, he argues. "But the few hundred that are actually really good are going to be world-changing."