The surprising repurcussions of making AI assistants sound human | WIRED

by Alex Kirkpatrick

18 May 2017

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ASK ALEXA ABOUT the weather, and it’ll tell you it’s sunny and 75 in a pleasant monotone. Prompt it to tell you a joke, and it’ll offer a pun in its signature staccato. Suggest that it sing a song, and it’ll belt out an auto-tuned country ballad. Amazon’s virtual assistant boasts a number of clever, humanlike abilities—but, as its voice betrays, Alexa is still just a robot.

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Alex Kirkpatrick is a passionate writer and science communicator...

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