Alexa is a welcome addition to Amazon's tablet

Gizmo Editor Review

What’s the first app you install on a new tablet computer? For me, it’s Amazon’s Kindle app. I have to have my book library close at hand and tablets have become my preferred reading platform. Close behind come Amazon’s music and streaming video apps along with Amazon’s  shopping app.

And now there’s Alexa, the voice-controlled personal assistant that we have added to the household through two stand-alone devices, the Amazon Dot and Tap. Alexa delivers news updates and weather reports, dims the hall lights, plays music and reads my current Kindle book, picking up where I left off.

Clearly, I’m all in with Amazon, which is why I was pleased to get my hands on the Amazon Fire Tablet after Xberts chose me to write this review and provided the product for free. Amazon’s line of Fire tablets are the first tablet devices to include Alexa built into the operating system, making it a tablet you can talk to and one that talks to you.

The Fire Tablet I received is Amazon’s starter model that has a 7-inch high-resolution screen, 8GB of memory and an SD slot for additional memory. It’s the version Amazon sells for $49.99.

How can a tablet with those specs have such a low price tag? One reason is the Fire Tablet contains ads. When you wake the tablet you see a screen selling a variety of products. So far, I’ve seen ads for Band Aids, bottled water, Starbucks’ fancy drinks and a leasing deal on a Genesis, Hyundai’s new luxury car.

But more important than the ads are the myriad offers buy or sample Amazon products like audio books from Amazon-owned Audible or a subscription to The Washington Post, which is owned by Amazon’s founder.

The Fire is not designed to be a multi-purpose tablet computer like the iPad Mini or the Samsung Galaxy Tab. Its job is to help you live inside the Amazon ecosystem where it’s easy to play music from your Amazon-housed collection, stream movies and TV shows from Amazon and shop for things like dog food or kitchen appliances. In other words, all of the things we’ve come to rely on Amazon to provide. And it does that job very, very well.

Setting up the Fire Tablet took a little longer than I had expected. It had previously been registered to someone else - perhaps it was a returned or refurbished item - so I had to start by re-registering with my own Amazon account. That instantly got my books and other Amazon stuff loaded into the tablet.

The Fire Tablet runs Google’s Android operating system, but you would barely know that by looking at it. The home screen is populated Amazon apps and as you swipe left, you drill deeper into your Amazon world.

Each swipe shows pages that display your books, music, videos, games, audiobooks and the digital newspapers or magazines that you have subscribed to. The book or movie you’ve most recently accessed is featured on each page along with related content that Amazon’s algorithms think you might want to purchase.

There’s no Google Play store on the Fire Tablet. To get new apps, you go to the Amazon’s app store where you can download Pandora, Netflix, YouTube and other popular apps.      

That was fine so far, but where was Alexa? The app was not pre-loaded with all the other Amazon apps as I expected. It turned out that the operating system needed to be updated - twice, actually - before Alexa was ready to ready to run.

With Amazon’s Dot and Echo, the devices are always listening for someone to say “Alexa” to launch the service. On the Fire Tablet, the process is slightly different. Alexa appears when you press and hold the Home icon for two seconds. When you hear a chime and see a blue line at the bottom of the screen, Alexa is ready to hear your question or command. You don’t have to say her name to get her attention.

Users who are new to Alexa can use the Alexa app to personalize the service by selecting applets from a library of skills. If you’re already an Alexa user, your library of skills will be linked to Alexa on the tablet. One feature that I particularly like is how Alexa will read any of my Kindle books that allow that functionality. I just have to say “Read 1984” and Alexa picks up where I left off.

Alexa is a welcome and useful addition to the Fire Tablet. It’s an non-threatening introduction to voice control that greatly expands the tablet’s usefulness. Now I have another way to get my daily news briefing, tune in to my local NPR radio station, play goofy music for the little kids and get answers to like “How hot is the sun?” And, of course, buy more dog food.

By: Ric Manning On 5/01/2017

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Something fishy at the Alexa conference

Brian Kane sees a lot of potential in Alexa, the voice-recognition technology inside the Amazon gadgets that exploded in popularity over the Christmas holidays. But he’s no fan of the way Amazon designed those gadgets, the Echo, Tap and Dot.

“It’s so new that it reeks of engineer,” the robotics educator at the Rhode Island School of Design told an audience at The Alexa Conference in Nashville last week. “I love Star Trek as much as anyone but we have to stop making what was in sci-fi movies 50 years ago.”

Developers and designers should think about building in emotion and social intelligence when they create modern devices. “Personality is the new ringtone,” he said. “Lose the ‘Assistant’ and ‘Agent.’ Nobody is asking for that. Think companion, friend or pet.”

So how would Kane add some personality to Alexa? Last fall, he took Amazon’s hockey puck-shaped Dot and wired it Big Mouth Billy Bass, an animatronic singing fish that was a popular novelty item in the early 2000s. When Alexa answers a question or command, Billy moves his head and wiggles his tail. It was goofy idea, but Kane said it illustrates his point that high-tech gadgets don’t have to be sterile and bland.

Brian Kane and his Alexa fish hack

Billy was a big hit among the programmers and enthusiasts who came to The Alexa Conference, an event organized by Bradley Metrock. His company, Score Publishing, helps authors who use Apple’s iBooks publishing platform and he sees Alexa and other voice technologies as one more  tool to help authors, small publishers and other content creators to expand their audience. Just as ebooks and audiobooks opened new opportunities, Metrock said “Alexa can help self-publishers extend our world into the next generation.”

Metrock included authors and publishers among the speakers at his conference at Vanderbilt University. Jolene Barto, a marketing manager at HarperCollins Christian Publishing, described how the company built Devotionals, an Alexa skill – essentially an app – that delivers a short inspirational reading.

The devotionals are audio segments of about five minutes clipped from audio books read by HarperCollins authors. Each one has an introduction and exit segment that promotes the book and the company’s collection. Users can connect to the publisher through the digital cards that they get in their Alexa app.

Bradley Metrock

“It’s kind of an experiment right now,” Barto said, but Alexa has the potential to expand the company’s connections to its readers and customers.

While HarperCollins used its own technical staff to do most of its Alexa work, other speakers described how users with above average programming abilities and a knowledge of Amazon Web Services can build an Alexa skill.

Tim Moses of Multiply walked through the Alexa API and developer’s platform that Amazon provides for free.  Moses showed an application he wrote in one evening that would let people who are registered for an event or meeting check in and out using their voice.

And Kevin Old of LifeWay, a Christian services supply company, showed how he used the Serverless Framework as a alternate route to the functions on Amazon Web Services that support Alexa and skills coding. Old Serverless to build a skill that reads requested Bible verses from an app called MyBible.

“This platform allows me – a single lone developer – to create an engaging user experience using the power of their voice,” he said.

Other speakers included developer Emily Lam, who looked at how Alexa will be integrated into vehicles, and Matt Cybulsky, who discussed applications for Alexa in the health care industry.

The conference also included an Alexathon skills coding competition. The winner was Xander Morrison, the Digital Community Coordinator at Sony Music's Provident Label Group. It took Morrison just 24 hours to create his Nashville Tour Guide as an Alexa skill.

Metrock said he plans to expand The Alexa Conference for 2018. The event will be held Jan. 17-20 and that venue and initial speakers will be announced by the end of February.

By: Ric Manning On 1/22/2017

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Alexa bandwagon rolls through CES

Amazon did not have a booth or any public visibility at CES, yet Alexa, its always-listening Siri-like digital assistant, was widely viewed as the star of the show.

Check out these headlines:

Yahoo Finance: CES 2017’s breakout star: Amazon’s Alexa 

Business Insider: Amazon’s Echo is building a coffin that’s custom-made for Google

Wired: Alexa just conquered CES. The World is next

Dozens of exhibitors jumped on the Alexa bandwagon with announcements of plans to incorporate Alexa into their products. The technologies ranged from kitchen appliances to cars to home automation and entertainment devices. A few samples:

Autos: Ford and VW said they would integrate Alexa for weather, navigation and other information. Hyundai had already connected its Blue Link system to Alexa.

Wearables: Martian is putting Alexa in a smartwatch. Sensory will put Alexa and other AI assistants in Bluetooth headphones.

Home security: ADT is adding Alexa control to its Pulse security system. Array and Brinks will make smart locks that that will lock with a voice command. Somfy showed a hub that uses Alexa to manage sensors and cameras.

Phones: Huawei will put a default Alexa app on its Mate 9 smartphone. Existing phones can download the Alexa app today. 

Appliances: Whirlpool showed washers, dryers, refrigerators and ovens that can be controlled with Alexa. Samsung and Neato are putting Alexa into it robot vacuum cleaners. LG put it in a refrigerator and a home robot. Conway announced a smart air purifier with Alexa inside.

Video: Dish will add Alexa to the Hopper DVR. Westinghouse and at least two other TV makers will put Amazon’s Fire TV with Alexa-remotes in new models.

Home control: Alexa is coming to a GE LED lamp, a Belkin smart plug, smart switches from iDevices, and a smart power strip from Incipio.

Toys: Lynx, a dancing robot from Ubtech, and Hugo were among the robots at CES that respond to Alexa. (You can see Lynx bust a move in the video below.) Aristotle is an Alexa speaker programmed specifically for kids.

Gadgets: Alexa will be included in a bedside clock and speaker, the Dok Talk charger that charges five portable devices, the Nightingale smart sleep-aid system, and Bixi, a gesture-control device.

By: Ric Manning On 1/10/2017

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