Alexa Shag Me A Ride: Amazon Adds Calling For An Uber Skill To Echo
Amazon's Echo smart speaker and digital assistant keeps getting smarter and smarter it seems and it's beginning to pay dividends for the company. So much so that recent reports note that Amazon's Echo is the most popular Bluetooth speaker in the etail channel right now, besting strong competitors like Bose, Sonos and Logitech. We gave Amazon's smart, musical little princess high marks in our full review for both versatility and responsiveness, as well as its future growth potential. AMZN has been committed to enhancing the platform since day one and Alexa, Echo's oh-so helpful digital persona has come a long way since she was introduced to market.
Recently Amazon has added home automation controls for the popular series of Smartthings devices, the ability to read you Kindle books, blast music via Spotify (Pandora was on-board out of the box), and order Dominos pizza delivery. But what if this SuperBowl Sunday you've had one too many cold ones and since you're an intelligent, conscientious, law-abiding individual, you need to call for a ride, rather than pulling a proverbial ZZ Top and driving while blind?
Well, that little ol' Amazon Echo apparently now has that covered too. Just holler on over to Alex and say "Alexa, call me a ride" or "order me an Uber" and then what the heck, go ahead tip back another cold one while you wait for your Uber driver to arrive. And while you're at it, pat yourself on the back for good decision-making too. What's most impressive about this update is that the Amazon Echo is fully tied-in to Uber's network service data and Alexa can estimate how far away your driver is, confirm the pick-up has been accepted by the driver and let you cancel the ride if need be as well.
It really is an impressive skill to add and demonstrate what the IOT or "Internet Of Things" is potentially capable of. As long as the machines remain in service for us and we don't end up in some skynet scenario of course. At any rate, the Echo seems harmless at least. A little 9 by 3 inch speaker isn't anything to sweat, right? Right?
Recently Amazon has added home automation controls for the popular series of Smartthings devices, the ability to read you Kindle books, blast music via Spotify (Pandora was on-board out of the box), and order Dominos pizza delivery. But what if this SuperBowl Sunday you've had one too many cold ones and since you're an intelligent, conscientious, law-abiding individual, you need to call for a ride, rather than pulling a proverbial ZZ Top and driving while blind?
It really is an impressive skill to add and demonstrate what the IOT or "Internet Of Things" is potentially capable of. As long as the machines remain in service for us and we don't end up in some skynet scenario of course. At any rate, the Echo seems harmless at least. A little 9 by 3 inch speaker isn't anything to sweat, right? Right?
