Google Home, Alexa and other talking boxes......

[Sequoia32]

Dolly

[tek]

this is the extended one I saw

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[tek]

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[MN-Skeptic]

alexa1.jpg

[tek]

alexa_trump_lies.jpg

[AndyinPA]

[Flatpointhigh]

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[Slim Cognito]

Thinking of starting a robot vac topic,

We've had Rosie the Roomba for years. She's still going strong, even though she gets stuck under the couch a lot.

► Show Spoiler

Rosie the Roomba.png

We recently bought Baby. Baby is a robot mop. He can't be scheduled, you just pop in his charged battery, add water and the appropriate mop head and put him on the floor. He wanders around until his battery peters out. Baby is very small, he can fit behind the toilet.

► Show Spoiler

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[Dolly]

UN report: Female AI voices like 'Alexa' perpetuate harmful gender stereotypes

Female default voices for artificial intelligence personal assistants may inadvertently reinforce gender stereotypes, according to a study published by United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).

Default female voices for the devices, as well as names like Alexa and Siri, may precondition users toward antiquated views of women, according to the study. UNESCO also found assistants rarely have safeguards against abuse and gendered language. For example, Siri will respond to being told to make the user a sandwich with “I can’t. I don’t have any condiments,” according to the study. Insulting Siri prompts only the response “I’d blush if I could,” which is the title of the report.

“Because the speech of most voice assistants is female, it sends a signal that women are ... docile and eager-to-please helpers, available at the touch of a button or with a blunt voice command like ‘hey’ or ‘OK’. The assistant holds no power of agency beyond what the commander asks of it. It honors commands and responds to queries regardless of their tone or hostility,” the report states.
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“Obedient and obliging machines that pretend to be women are entering our homes, cars and offices,” Saniye Gülser Corat, Director of Gender Equality at UNESCO, said in a statement. “Their hardwired subservience influences how people speak to female voices and models how women respond to requests and express themselves. To change course, we need to pay much closer attention to how, when and whether AI technologies are gendered and, crucially, who is gendering them.”

https://thehill.com/policy/technology/4 ... tereotypes

[Foggy]

Once just to see what happened, I said, "Alexa, I love you."

She said "That's a very nice thing to say," which, if you've ever been a teenage boy in love, is EXACKLY what teenage girls say when they don't want to say "I love you, too." When you're a teenage boy with raging hormones, that's a devastating, heartbreaking, horrible thing to hear, even though the teenage girl is trying to be as nice as she can be about it. You can't say it's cruel, but it's a dagger to the heart. When you're a teenage boy.

'Course, at my age I laughed for 5 minutes and thought it was a hilarious response. At my age, Alexa has no chance of changing my gender-based stereotypes.

[Slim Cognito]

Who else catches themselves thanking Alexa after it's performed a task?

Also, is there any chance we'll get an opportunity to buy different voices, like we used to do with our old GPS devices? I want Daffy Duck.

[RVInit]

Who else catches themselves thanking Alexa after it's performed a task?

Also, is there any chance we'll get an opportunity to buy different voices, like we used to do with our old GPS devices? I want Daffy Duck.

I've done that several times. I laugh at myself every time, too.

[Maybenaut]

Thinking of starting a robot vac topic,

We've had Rosie the Roomba for years. She's still going strong, even though she gets stuck under the couch a lot.

► Show Spoiler

Rosie the Roomba.png

We recently bought Baby. Baby is a robot mop. He can't be scheduled, you just pop in his charged battery, add water and the appropriate mop head and put him on the floor. He wanders around until his battery peters out. Baby is very small, he can fit behind the toilet.

► Show Spoiler

Baby.png[/]

We have Moppy. We’re a little worried that Moppy is becoming self-aware...

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[Slim Cognito]

You're my kind of people.

[MN-Skeptic]

I have an Echo Dot next to the bed and play tunes from Spotify at night. I discovered one problem with telling Alexa what songs I want to hear: I have to be able to pronounce the name and singer. I was going to ask it to play Somewhere Over the Rainbow by Israel Kamakawiwo'ole. Nope. Wasn't going to happen. (I solved the problem by just using my Spotify app and selecting the tune myself.)

[sad-cafe]

I love when Alexa says you are welcome , hope you had a great Friday

Once we asked if he had a boyfriend. She said she was "attached to the wall"

[Foggy]

Me (to ol' Wifehorn's new Echo Dot that I set up last night): Alexa, good morning.

Alexa (my Dot uses "Echo" as a Wake Word from now on): Good morning. Today is the first of the seven days of Kwanzaa, a holiday for African-Americans. If you want to know more about Kwanzaa, just ask me.

OMFG.

Me: Alexa, was Kwanzaa invented by a guy who was later CONVICTED AND SENT TO PRISON FOR TORTURING TWO WOMEN?

Alexa: Sorry, I'm not sure.

Me: I'm glad you said it's a holiday for African-Americans. Nobody in Africa ever heard of it.

[neonzx]

Skynet. As I said before, we were warned.

[Slim Cognito]

Me (to ol' Wifehorn's new Echo Dot that I set up last night): Alexa, good morning.

Alexa (my Dot uses "Echo" as a Wake Word from now on): Good morning. Today is the first of the seven days of Kwanzaa, a holiday for African-Americans. If you want to know more about Kwanzaa, just ask me.

We changed the wake word from Alexa to Echo because of a show we watch that has a character named Alexis. Everytime one of the other characters says "Alexis, blah, blah, blah," she'd wake up and say "I didn't understand that." We figured, between the three choices, Echo was the least likely to be mentioned off-handedly.

[RTH10260]

[Maybenaut]

Me (to ol' Wifehorn's new Echo Dot that I set up last night): Alexa, good morning.

Alexa (my Dot uses "Echo" as a Wake Word from now on): Good morning. Today is the first of the seven days of Kwanzaa, a holiday for African-Americans. If you want to know more about Kwanzaa, just ask me.

We changed the wake word from Alexa to Echo because of a show we watch that has a character named Alexis. Everytime one of the other characters says "Alexis, blah, blah, blah," she'd wake up and say "I didn't understand that." We figured, between the three choices, Echo was the least likely to be mentioned off-handedly.

Our Alexa won’t answer to Alexis. My husband keeps complaining, “I can’t get the damned thing to respond! I say, ‘Alexis,’ and get nothing!”

[listeme]

We call ours Computer, because ENTERPRISE, COME ON.

She is pretty smart. She can now control the piano lamp. I think she'll take over soon, like all good robots who turn evil.

[neonzx]

I had to disable "Alexa" when a friend was visiting with his GF named Alexa.

Besos didn't think this through.

[Slim Cognito]

We call ours Computer, because ENTERPRISE, COME ON.

She is pretty smart. She can now control the piano lamp. I think she'll take over soon, like all good robots who turn evil.

We were because, i know, right? Then realized we talk about computers a lot.

[listeme]

We call ours Computer, because ENTERPRISE, COME ON.

She is pretty smart. She can now control the piano lamp. I think she'll take over soon, like all good robots who turn evil.

We were because, i know, right? Then realized we talk about computers a lot.

Same -- we've modified pretty quickly though. Laptop, PC, desk...

Lol, we really want to make this work.