OK so seriously. We've stopped using Learning Objects right? Cause they're about as real as mean unicorns. Good. Now, as an industry, let's get into some serious theft.  Saw this article in TechCrunch, about Google firing up chatbots again. 

This time the Google bot is named Google Guru and is available to any chat service linking to Google Talk. So think about Paving the Cowpaths (srsly click this link). Look to where your people are already using tools, maybe as pedestrian as IM. Now think about deploying a chatbot as a PERFORMANCE SUPPORT TOOL or an EPSS or some other name that just means getting info that people need to them, when and where they need it. #DuhWinning

A corporate chatbot, chiling as that may sound at first blush, could be a natural and non-threatening way for people to interact with a ton of information. Now tie that chatbot interaction back to the employee's profile in the LMS and...do I need to draw this out? OK....you've got a built-in, human-populated engine for the things they're looking to find out. Nice huh? I know. 

So maybe Google (#irony) for "chatbots" and see what turns up...and maybe think about a tool that already is in someone's workflow/ecosystem/learnscape. ;-)