Bot At Your Service

You could call it animated FAQs. You could think of it as the precursor to Data, the famous starTrek android. Or, you could see it for what it is: a new development in the quest to gather information about customers and thus provide them with relevant products and services.

"It" is Eve, the eGain Assistant that was developed by Big Science, a company recently purchased by eGain. Eve calls herself a "virtual service agent." But Tom Rearick--now the director of products for eGain and previously the founder and president of Big Science and one of the main brains behind Eve--likes to say of assistant technology that, "In the right hands, it's the ultimate permission-based marketing/sales tool."

1. Android - An android is a humanoid robot or synthetic organism designed to look and act like a human, especially one with a body having a flesh-like resemblance.