The future of Amazon Alexa: turning off lights and locking doors
Tom Taylor, senior vice president of Amazon’s Alexa division, said that the tech giant was working on enabling its digital voice assistant to recognise certain unique sounds around a household, creating ‘ambient intelligence’.
For instance, it may be able to hear a baby crying and respond by turning on soothing music.
However, Amazon plans that users will soon be able to teach their Alexa devices to recognise sounds distinct to their homes, with just a few audio samples, and then program it to respond in a certain way.
Taylor also added that Alexa would soon be programmed to turn off lights in the house or lock doors.
“This is the next big leap forward for technology inside and outside the home,” Taylor said of the future Alexa. “It understands you and adapts accordingly. It’s there when you need it, recedes into the background when you don’t, and it’s able to take action for you.”