Alexa, talk like Samuel L. Jackson! Amazon now allows Echo users to swap smart speaker’s voice for the actor’s – and you can even have him CURSE at you
- Echo users can now purchase the voice of Samuel L. Jackson for a dollar
- Jackson’s voice steps in for the company’s popular Alexa voice assistant
- The feature reads calendar updates, tells jokes, sings songs, and more
- Amazon has said it may include other celebrity voices in the future
Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant now has some celebrity competition.
Starting last week, the company began letting users purchase the voice of actor Samuel L. Jackson as a fill-in for the company’s popular voice assistant, Alexa.
This means users who buy the voice for $0.99 are able to receive audio responses from their Echo device in the actor’s iconic voice.
Actor Samuel L. Jackson (pictured above) is the first-ever celebrity voice option to make its way onto the Echo speaker
To use the new feature, users who purchase the Alexa alternate must prompt their Echo device to respond in Jackson’s voice by specifically phrasing their queries.
For instance, anyone who purchases the feature can activate Jackson’s voice by uttering something like ‘Hey Alexa, ask Sam Jackson if…’
The new feature stops short of fully replacing Alexa and currently only allows users to query Jackson for the weather, jokes, and for details about their calendar or the time or the news.
While the functionality is currently limited in scope, adult users will still be able to enjoy Jackson’s more adult vocal repertoire, including an explicit mode that sprinkles responses with curse words.
According to Amazon, which unveiled the feature during a keynote release in October, Samuel L. Jackson will be among the first of multiple celebrities voice integrations
Amazon’s Echo speakers have became well-known for their use of ‘Alexa,’ Amazon’s popular voice assistant
When those celebrities are set to arrive on the device, however, is currently unclear and Amazon hasn’t yet hinted at who those additions may be.
In addition to spicing up users’ interactions, the celebrity voices may also help Amazon squeeze extra money out of its Echo products.
To activate the voice on your device, you can tell Alexa to ‘introduce me to Samuel L. Jackson.’ Your device will ask you whether you’d like to pay $1 plus tax for the voice.
Say ‘yes’ and then select whether you want Jackson’s voice to be ‘clean’ or explicit.
The voice can also be purchase using Amazon’s mobile app or through the companies desktop website.