OpenAI's launch of Dots, an always-on AI agent with a colorful avatar, was quickly overshadowed by a domain-related coincidence. The domain dot.com belongs to Elon Musk's xAI and currently redirects to the download page for Grok, xAI's chatbot. According to Whois data cited by TechCrunch, the domain changed hands in July.
The internet immediately speculated that xAI bought the domain as a prank, especially since OpenAI's product is named Dots. An X user who goes by @birdabo flagged the redirect in a viral post. However, TechCrunch notes that xAI has not commented, and the purchase could have been routine domain buying—perhaps to capture typos of "bot." That explanation is less convincing because xAI does not own bot.com or other similar typo domains like vot.com.
The more direct domain, dots.com, is still held by a long-defunct company, so xAI did not grab that one. Whether the redirect was a calculated troll or an accident, the timing has made it a talking point in the AI industry's ongoing rivalry between Musk and OpenAI.