There’s some chatter in the gurusphere that voice devices will replace smart phones as the primary personal electronic device. Color me skeptical but we do have this item that self-service customer care vendor Zappix has made its interactive voice response tools available on Amazon Alexa. It makes sense: Alexa already hears you curse when something doesn’t work, so she might as well offer to help.

What can Facebook and friends do to regain public trust? Banning services that sell fake followers is a good start, as Facebook-owned Instagram did not long ago. But selling ads to companies that violate the ban is an even better way to make things worse. Sure enough, TechCrunch found that’s exactly what’s been happening. Raise your hand if you’re surprised. I thought so.

Martech keeps taking larger bites out of marketing budgets: 17.3% last year, 19.9% this year, 23.5% next year, and 30.9% five years from now, according to the latest CMO Survey. This despite barely more than half (56.4%) of current tools being used and nearly half (48.8%) of the survey respondents reporting worse-than-expected results. Oddly enough, marketers rate selecting marketing technologies as the thing they do best.