People now spend more time on mobile messaging apps than on social networks. Sensing the shift, businesses and brands globally are starting to connect with customers on chat apps such as WeChat, Facebook, WhatsApp, and Kik. Rather than deploy humans, they're turning to bots, virtual assistants that respond to open-ended text messages. New bots are springing up to handle all kinds of use cases: shopping, ride-hailing, customer service queries. This episode of The Premise explores technology's new bot economy and bot culture, including interviews with Dennis Mortensen, cofounder and CEO of x.ai, a meeting-scheduler bot, and Peter Fjallstrom, a Swedish programmer who created a household bot for his family using Slack. Hosted by Bruce Upbin and Parmy Olson.