Amazon just announced a whole new slate of products, but is there anything worth talking about from it?
Amazon just had its new product launch, and we had an amazing opportunity to be a part of this exclusive event.
But what did I learn from this? Is there anything new? Or is it just a rehash of the same old products in a new wrapper?
One of my favorite parts of the entire launch was their announcement of a new generative AI, LLM.
Up until now, talking to Alexa has been like talking to a robot, where half the time she would just give you basic answers to your questions, while the other half of the time she couldn’t understand what you were saying.
And with things like ChatGPT coming out, I think most of us saw Alexa as being outdated, boring, and on her way out.
After all, you can have a whole conversation with ChatGPT without having to put in a keyword like “Hey Alexa” every time you want to say something.
But now, with LLM, Amazon has taken Alexa to whole new levels that can now rival even the best virtual assistants in the world.
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Alexa Interaction
“It’s about to get much easier to interact with your smart home…all powered by LLM”
Charlie French, Amazon Director of Smart Home
One of the many complaints that many others and I have had with Alexa was how hard it was to not only add in smart devices but control them by voice and talking to Alexa.
How many times have you been trying to turn on your kitchen lights using Alexa, but she doesn’t do it?
It could either be because she didn’t understand what you said, your screaming kid in the background caught her ear, and she didn’t process what you said, or the absolute worst, you didn’t say it in the exact right phrasing.
The difference between telling Alexa to “turn on my kitchen lights” and “tell Vivint to turn on my kitchen lights” was too much for Alexa to be able to process, and she had no clue what to do.
Conversational
At the core of their foundations, Amazon wanted users to be able to have conversations with Alexa rather than having to give specific commands.
What this means, is you no longer have to start up every conversation with hey Alexa, but with a simple Alexa, let’s chat opens her up to a world of opportunity.
Once you’ve given her the command to chat, the world is yours. You can tell her to turn on your kitchen lights, bring up the score of the Lakers and Celtics game, and even send you the highlights to your phone.
Even if you’re interrupted in the middle of talking to her, she can filter out what you are saying and give you not only contextual verbal responses but also a great visual response on the all-new Echo Show 8.
Amazon is also currently working on an updated version where Alexa will sound even more human than this version, where she will be able to laugh and be surprised based on the context.
And it even works with the new and improved Fire TV as well. Want to find a comedy with the guy who played the lawyer in Breaking Bad?
Just ask Alexa, and she’ll pull it up for you. Are you a fan of video games and want to watch a movie with that interest in mind?
The LLM has your back covered and will find that for you.
Alexa will even go down the rabbit hole with you and start comparing movies or finding movies played by actors you know and love.
And along with that, on the Fire TV, coming soon, you will be able to verbally be able to create AI-generated images to save to your device, or even turn your photos into beautiful art without the press of a single button.
Real World Applications
The second foundation of the LLM is how AI can enhance real-world applications.
With the Echo Hub or the Echo Show 8, with new room adaptation technology built in, it can know where you’re at in the room and adjust based on that.
For example, if you’re on the other side of the room and you ask her to bring up the weather, she can tell where you’re at in the room, and zoom in so you can still see it from across the room.
And when it comes to the very real world of controlling your smart home devices, Alexa is now 40% faster at controlling those devices for you.
This means that when you tell her to turn on your lights, in whatever way you want to tell her, she’s going to get those lights on at the speed of a worker on commission rather than hourly.
Personalization
And, of course, no AI worth their weight is complete without it being customized.
Nothing is more frustrating than pulling up your Netflix account and seeing that people have been watching shows that you wouldn’t normally watch on your profile.
It lessens the experience for you and changes the entire personalization experience that you worked so hard to create. With LLM, you can have completely customized profiles for you and your family, with Alexa using those profiles and learning from your history to improve.
When you ask her questions, you aren’t going to just get the first thing that pops up on a Google search as your answer. If that was the case, you might as well just search yourself. But using context, Alexa will be able to form results based not only on what you want but why you want it.
Did You Know:
The new generation of Alexa is powered by a custom-built large language model (LLM), specifically designed for voice interactions. This LLM allows Alexa to understand the nuances and context of human language, leading to more natural and productive interactions.
Trust
And the last foundation on the building block to creating arguably one of the most interactive AIs is trust.
How many times have we all heard, or even mentioned ourselves, that our biggest fear of Alexa is that she is always listening to us?
Nobody wants their every conversation to be recorded and sent to a company to analyze and use in whatever ways they want.
To help combat that, Amazon made it so you can always see when the devices are listening by seeing the blue light indicator, or even just listening for an audible tone.
If you want to see what has been recorded by Alexa, you can always get on the app as well and scroll through them, deleting whatever you don’t want on there, or keeping the rest there to help with the personalization.
Conclusion
With this new generative AI that Amazon has come out with, I am extremely excited about the possibilities that it opens up.
Amazon seemed to be falling far behind the competition when it came to smart homes, but with this new and improved Alexa, I see it being a game changer that brings them right back to the top.
Some of the devices can already be pre-ordered on Amazon’s website, and are sure to become a welcome addition to your existing smart home, as it’s compatible with many different types of devices.