Amazon starts to reveal plans for .BOT TLD

Amazon has announced a discovery tool for Alexa skills using HOME.BOT.

The .BOT domain extension is part of Amazon’s strategy for the artificial intelligence market. Eligibility is currently limited to owners of published software bots. Amazon intends to utilize .BOT as a discovery tool for artificial intelligence applications.

Alexa has rapidly become the market leader in Smart Speakers. Smart Speakers are the latest sales channel for companies to sell products and services. As of January 2019, there are over 75,000 applications or “Skills” that are currently available on Alexa.

The HOME.BOT tool enables consumers to discover new and interesting Alexa skills that help them complete a task or solve a problem and serves as a new way for customers to discover skills, providing them the ability to browse skills through a rotating selection of Amazon-curated tasks and skills collections. There’s a “Find a recipe” task, for instance, which features skills having to do with cooking and meal planning, and “Get organized”, which contains skills that help with creating to-do lists for tasks such as shopping, groceries and daily chores. Consumers can also discover skills by simply typing what they are looking for within the HOME.BOT chat interface. HOME.BOT can search the entire Alexa skills catalog and surface the skills that can help the consumer, where and when they want it, to create an optimal and seamless discovery experience.

More and more brands are developing “branded” Alexa skills. For example, the “Find a recipe” skill may return a response from the Food Network or Good Housekeeping magazine.

Alexa skills related to domain names are sparse but a few early pioneers are offering Alexa skills for name availability checks.

We will keep you posted as Amazon continues to develop the .BOT Online Space. To learn more about .bot, please visit https://www.encirca.com/bot/