It's Not Their Pop Idol, but a Bot. Fans Cheer Anyway.

In January, Christina Ausset, a 24-year-old Maroon 5 fan in France, spotted an enticing Twitter post from another of the band's followers: "I just had a conversation with Maroon 5! Awesome!" The interaction, it turned out, had been conducted on Facebook Messenger with Maroon 5's chatbot -- an automated program designed to respond to basic commands. Not exactly a conversation with Adam Levine, Ms. Ausset noted, but it didn't matter. She now happily talks to the bot, too. "Having Maroon 5 on Messenger," she wrote in an email, "makes you feel really close to your favorite artists!"