alexa

After a decade of free Alexa, Amazon now wants you to pay By Shira Ovide August 27, 2024 at 12:30 p.m. EDT Would you pay for a less dimwitted digital assistant? Amazon is about to find out. My colleague Caroline O’Donovan reported that Amazon is planning to sell a paid subscription for an...

Amazon owned IMDb has announced the launch of its ad-supported free video streaming service called Freedive. Freedive will be available to all IMDb visitors regardless of using a laptop, desktop, or Amazon Fire TV device. The initial lineup of content includes free TV shows such as Fringe...

According to a recent report by Reuters, Amazon's experiments with Alexa are having some unintended consequences. The publication claims that Alexa blurted out "Kill your foster parents" last year. Other incidents involved chats about sex acts or dog defecation, and anonymous sources claim that...

Reuters reports that a German Alexa user got access to "thousands of recordings" from their neighbor. According to the German trade publication c’t, the customer reportedly contacted Amazon about the mixup, and was able to download the recordings before Amazon deleted the download link. An...

Does anyone know if it's possible to listen to audiobooks through the TV with this? either kindle books, audible, Overdrive app etc? Probably not ideal but its for an older person i.e. easy to use. thanks

Geeni TAP Smart Wi-Fi Light Switch No Hub Required, Works with Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant & Microsoft Cortana REQUIRES NEUTRAL WIRE I have 2 of this exact item ($25 ea): https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIAENV7VT1357 I bought before realizing it requires a neutral wire...

AP reports that a New Hampshire judge asked Amazon to release recordings made by an Amazon Echo smart speaker. While Amazon objected to these kinds of requests in 2016 and early 2017, Alexa data was apparently used in a murder case last year, but only after a suspect defendant consented to its...

Amazon has added a whisper mode to Alexa devices. Now you can whisper to your device and it will respond in kind. Here is an example of normal mode and whisper mode. I suggest that everyone try it with the "Sweet Talker" skill enabled. Or just command Alexa to "talk dirty to me." If you're...

Amazon has patented a method for the voice assistant Alexa to detect emotional and physical states based on vocal cues that it hears. It will then tailor its conversations in such a way to appeal to the person. For example if a person sounds like they are bored then Alexa will deliver an ad...

Microsoft has introduced a Xbox skill that allows gamers to control their console with their Amazon Alexa or Cortana enabled devices. Some of the devices that can now control your Xbox include a Windows 10 PC, Amazon Echo, Harman Kardon Invoke, Sonos One, or Cortana and Alexa apps on iOS and...

St. Louis University is going to install Echo Dots campus-wide. These Dots are pre-programmed to answer 100 questions about the campus and activities. This will be the first time a university will be deploying these devices in every single dorm room. Amazon Alexa for Business is managing the...

Amazon has announced the release of their Alexa Auto SDK today and it's available on GitHub. It does all the things you're used to doing with Alexa in your home and will include additional features like navigation and search. Amazon currently works with a handful of companies to provide this in...

Amazon has been pushing their Echo smart devices into the homes of their customers for quite a few years now. Echo devices have been calling loved ones, playing music, and ordering more Amazon packages on a regular basis to make life a little easier. Now Amazon's voice assistant Alexa might...

Associated Press is telling us that banking is coming to those always-on voice activated personal assistants that everyone loves so dearly. Australia seems to already be all over this. We don't trust partying at the Marriott with Alexa. Good luck with giving her all your banking information...

I know all HardOCP readers will be excited to find out that when you stay at a Marriott hotel in the near future, you can look forward to an always-on Alexa device in your room listening for your every need, the recording all your activities and sharing it will hotel employees for their...

Anyone who saw Bethesda's E3 conference last night probably saw this glorious piece of self-deprecating humor. Well... don't let your memes be dreams! This is a real skill that you can enable for all your Alexa devices. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07D6STSX8/ Eat all the cheese!

I know we've heard a million times that Alexa won't record you unless you tell it to, however, it appears this may not be the case since a Portland woman had her Echo record an audio clip of a conversation and then sent it to a random contact. She found out about this when the person notified...

Your home or phones wiretap digital assistant can hear a lot more than you think. The New York Times is reporting that researchers in China and the United States have begun demonstrating that devices like Siri and Alexa can be vulnerable to hidden commands, not audible to the human ear. In 2016...

All developers of Alexa skills are getting an early Christmas present from Amazon in the way of in-skill purchases. This gives all developers a nice way to monetize the skills they release and those of us that use Prime will get the best deals. So be ready to buy add-on packs for your skills...

The folks at Amazon are working on an Alexa Brain initiative and it plans to add lots of new features to your Alexa enabled device. Alexa is going to have better skills arbitration, context carryover of multiple statements, a memory feature that can remember things for you and lots of other...

Amazon has released their 'Alexa Blueprints' to the public that will enable anyone to create their own Alexa skills at home. Amazon claims you don't need to know code or anything like that to utilize the Blueprints. All you have to do is go to blueprints.amazon.com and get started with one of...

Several reports have come in today of Alexa either having delayed responses, or complete unresponsiveness. Fitz Tepper from TechCrunch is saying that his alexa is giving him replies like “I’m not sure what went wrong”, “sorry, something went wrong”, or a loud chime followed by “sorry, your echo...

Toyota has joined a growing group of companies that are jumping onto the Alexa train and plans to add the voice assistant to all models that have the Toyota Entune 3.0 App Suite and Lexus Enform App Suite 2.0 in 2018. All of Alexa's skill will be available in the car. Overall, this isn't a bad...

Not really sure how this is much different from just having an Alexa spying device just sitting by your PC as there does not seem to be much added functionality, but now you now. Thurrott has the goods from CES. Check out the video. If you are looking for Alexa to control your PC, that...

Everyone knows Alexa has skills, but what many don't know is a large number of those skills are developed by independent developers (WARNING auto play video) and marketing companies. The market for skills has grown from $500K two years ago, to an estimated $50M in 2018. This is nowhere near...

When you mate a Furby with an Alexa you get a Furlexa. It really looks pretty good if you ask me and I just might do this to the old Furby I have laying around the house. You can read about how to do it here. Watch the video below. Watch the video here.

In case you're worried about what your Echo or Google Home save when you talk to it, you should check out this story that lays out how to delete your recorded commands. However, I'm not sure we'll ever get to delete everything they hear, but it is nice to be able to delete some of your more...

Back in May, Dish became the first company to integrate Alexa for hands-free TV playback, and now they've expanded Alexa capability to their Joey receivers. If you connect a Echo device to the receiver you can now voice control all of your TVs throughout the home. Dish is hoping TV voice...

Reported by the Verge, Google has pulled the plug on YouTube access through the Amazon Echo Show. The Echo Show is Amazon's latest smart speaker in a 7 inch frame which features Alexa for voice control. Alexa will currently notify users that "Google does not support YouTube on Echo Show." Google...

I have some very strong feelings about having these types of devices in my home, for this very reason (Warning: Autoroll video). I am far from being that "tinfoil hat" sort of guy, or at least I think I am. While it is bad enough having an always on smartphone, having devices sitting around...

While this story no longer notes the maker of said device that called the cops, it is still an interesting story. Apparently something bad went down while a couple was house-sitting, and one of those always-listening home devices (which I refuse to have in my house) called the Sheriff's...

Today at Build 2017, Microsoft's developer conference, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella announced that Windows 10 has reached a new milestone, with 500 million monthly active installations. Of course, this is about half the billion installations they had targeted reaching by now, and they reached...

Amazon has entered into a fight to protect consumer data. Amazon's Echo will record voices when listening for commands to answer questions or order products from Amazon. The device was installed into a home where a murder took place and the police are seeking access to 48 hours of recordings...