HomeWinBuzzer NewsMicrosoft Officially Debuts Zo Bot and Discusses Other AI Projects

Microsoft Officially Debuts Zo Bot and Discusses Other AI Projects

Bots are a big part of Microsoft’s plans, as the company explained at AI Day. The Zo chat bot is now official and Microsoft also talked about bots coming to Skype, Cortana SDK, and Bing Ads.

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A week ago, introduced Zo.ai, the latest chat bot as a preview on Kik. Now the company has formally announced the bot at its AI day in San Francisco. As well as discussing the capabilities of Zo, Microsoft has also elaborated on other AI projects.

As we mentioned in the previous report, Zo is a sequel of sorts to the Tay.ai chat bot. While Tay ended up giving hateful comments that were racist within days, Zo is already doing better. That's because Microsoft's new bot is more locked down and does not allow some kinds of content.

At its event on December 13, the company said the chat bot has already gained 115,000 users. That's not bad for a bot that has only enjoyed a soft launch so far on one service.

Zo is currently offering jumbled responses, which is expected this early in its life. The idea is that more interactions will improve the bot's abilities to form smart responses. Indeed, eventually users should be able to have a semblance of a conversation and extended dialog.

AI Day Announcements

At AI Day, the company also debuted a bot that integrates into the recently launched . The Slack competitor is an organization-based communication platform and will tap into bots. The newest is called WhoBot and it can learn who a user is by their documents and conversations.

Microsoft also discussed new bot additions to Skype, including talking bots delivered through Skype calling API.

Another AI breakthrough is Cortana Skills Kit and Cortana Devices SDK. This service aims to entice more developers into building bots. Dev's can leverage bots created in the Bot Framework and publish them to .

Yesterday, Microsoft announced that advertisers will get bot integration in the form of a virtual account manager. This will all be done through machine learning, artificial intelligence, bots and standard messaging.

SourceZDNet
Luke Jones
Luke Jones
Luke has been writing about all things tech for more than five years. He is following Microsoft closely to bring you the latest news about Windows, Office, Azure, Skype, HoloLens and all the rest of their products.

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