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Jennifer Pattison Tuohy

Jennifer Pattison Tuohy

Senior Reviewer, Smart Home

Senior Reviewer, Smart Home

    More From Jennifer Pattison Tuohy

    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    Generative-AI-powered Fire TV search will help you find better stuff to watch

    The new Alexa LLM will power a more conversational search experience on Fire TV.

    Using the Alexa voice remote you can dig down through options on the myriad of streaming services and even ask it to narrow down choices based on random facts like “Which movie should have won an Oscar but didn’t?”

    Now, who is making that call.

    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    Want to advertise The Avengers in your kid’s bedroom? Get a new Echo Pop Kids.

    The new Echo Pop Kids will cost $49.99 and include Amazon’s Kids Plus service.

    But, boy, do they look ugly.

    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    Alexa Eye Gaze offers a new way to control Alexa on a Fire tablet

    This accessibility feature Amazon just announced lets you use your eye gaze to control smart home devices, audio, video, and more Alexa features. It will be available later this year for free, on the Fire Max 11 tablet.

    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    “Alexa, let’s chat.”

    Wow, the new Alexa sounds way more ... normal. Limp is demoing it live on stage and having a (somewhat successful) conversation about — what else — football.

    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    The new Alexa LLM-powered voice assistant will work on the original Echo that launched in 2014.

    That’s ... impressive.

    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    In the new Echo Show 8, Alexa will be 40 percent faster.

    Shown today during Amazon’s hardware event, this will be a huge improvement. Personally, I’ve found smart displays are often slower than the standard Echo speakers.

    Echo Show 8 shown in an animated GIF
    <em>Echo Show 8</em>
    <em>Echo Show 8</em>
    1/3
    Echo Show 8
    Image: Amazon
    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    A new, smarter Alexa is on the way.

    Dave Limp says a superhuman voice assistant is within reach as he takes us through a history of its efforts in the smart home at Amazon’s Fall hardware event. There are nearly a billion devices connected to Alexa today, he says. Yes, mainly for timers and alarms — but also smart home, which he says is up 25 percent year on year.

    Dave Limp at his last Amazon event.
    Dave Limp at his last Amazon event.
    The Fire TV should be at the heart of Amazon’s smart home

    Amazon’s fall hardware event is taking place this week, and the company will undoubtedly be searching for its next big hardware hit. But how about making its existing hardware (and software) better?

    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    How to use Philips Hue’s new smart security systemHow to use Philips Hue’s new smart security system
    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy
    The coolest smart home gadgets I saw in BerlinThe coolest smart home gadgets I saw in Berlin
    Jennifer Pattison Tuohy