More people have concluded it’s a bad idea to put an always-on, internet-connected microphone in their house. Or, at least, they’ve decided not to buy things through it: just 7% of global consumers said they use a voice-assisted device to complete purchases multiple times each month in this Episerver survey, far down from 17% in last year’s survey. Voice-based product search fell from 22% to 8%. Added evidence of shifting attitudes: 53% said they want more anonymity while just 28% want more personalization.

Let’s stick with integration and finish with news that emotion detection vendor Behavioral Signals will now feed its analytics into AI-driven call center platform Neuraswitch. The combined system will measure the emotional state of both callers and agents and make helpful suggestions for what to do next.

With CDP vendors increasing their workforces by 3.4% in six months, compared with an average of 0.2% each six months over the prior two years, the sector seems to be growing again, according to our own semi-annual industry update. There is much talk of composable CDPs but they still employ no more than 5% of the sector workforce. What is a clear trend is the acquisition of independent CDPs by vendors interested in adding a CDP to a larger system (usually an activation system).