Amazon has begun rolling out an update to its Alexa digital assistant that adds the ability to select a male voice. In addition, the manufacturer has added a new word that activates the digital assistant.
According to The Verge , the new voice assistant option actually appeared a few days ago, when the company announced that in the near future Alexa will speak in the voices of the famous basketball player Shaquille O’Neal (Shaquille O’Neal) and American actress Melissa McCarthy (Melissa McCarthy).
The activator words “Alexa”, “Computer”, “Echo” and “Amazon”, which the company has been using for many years, have added a new word “Ziggy”. It can be used with both the new male digital assistant voice and the female one. There are two ways to select the Alexa male voice: either manually in the voice assistant settings, or by the “Change your voice” command. The setting for changing the activator word works in a similar way. It is enough to say “Change your wake word” and pronounce a new activator word. The ability to select one or another activator word depends on the smart device of the Amazon ecosystem that supports the work of the Alexa assistant.
Unlike Apple and Google, which have long since added male-voiced options to their digital assistants Siri and Google Assistant, Amazon has remained true to tradition. Alexa was first used in the first generation of Echo smart speakers released in 2013.
Alexa male voice is currently available as an option for US users only. In the future, the company will release the update to other markets.