What’s the story?
It seems that when the words “technology issues” are associated with a female WWE Superstar, it sadly involves compromising photographs hacked from a phone.
In this instance, however (and thankfully), the issue is not only benign but also kind of funny. For wrestling fans with a certain voice-activated digital home assistant, segments on Raw involving the brand’s Women’s Champion have been causing a bit of inconvenience.
The background
While voice-activated digital assistants have been around for quite some time – such as Siri on Apple’s iPhone, for example – it’s only been in the last few years that stationary, home-based units have been popular.
One of the more widely used is Amazon’s Echo, and its many variations, which uses an assistant “A.I.” named “Alexa.” Users can activate the assistant by saying “Alexa” out loud, and then making a request – such as setting an alarm, getting a weather report, or playing a song.
I think you can see where this is going.
The heart of the matter
While pretty technologically advanced, Amazon’s Echo units can’t distinguish between live voice and voices from television. So, when someone on WWE Raw says the name “Alexa”, Echo units within earshot wake up and await commands. Fortunately, nobody on Raw has said “Alexa, order thirty 16-pound bags of cat food”... yet.
What’s next?
In case you were wondering, WWE is not oblivious to this issue. as they recently put out a video regarding the “issue” on WWE.com.
Fortunately, Amazon gives Echo and Dot Echo owners the option to change the wake-up command from “Alexa” to a number of other options – including the Star Trek-related “Computer.”
Author’s take
I really like my Amazon Dot Echo – and I really like Alexa Bliss (Ohio represent!) – and while this is amusing to me, I can sort of see how this can be a pain in the butt for some. But, since Alexa isn’t gonna change her name just to keep the rest of us from being inconvenienced, I guess we’re going to have to deal with it,
Send us news tips at [email protected]
