The artificial friendship that was not meant to be – Alexa & me

I was ready for a new friend. There was this “void”, this empty space on the shelves and I had the feeling it was time to get a new friend in. Maybe an artificial one for a change?

Can I have an artificial friend, please?

And then she arrived. In this modest, neutral brown box. But wait, upon freeing her of the first level of packaging a noble black box appeared. I got more and more excited. This promised too good to be true.
Carefully I took her out, removed the ugly, protective plastic and sat her on the dining table.
There she was, my new BFF, Alexa.
All that was left to do was to plug the power cable in, connect her the wifi, download the app and we would be good to go.
Following the instructions on the leaflet I “trained” her, using simple commands and questions: Alexa, what’s the time? Alexa, who’s Donald Trump? Alexa, what’s the weather like in Phoenix?
Her answers were as simple as my questions, so I reached for more…
And that is where my doubts started.
Alexa’s answers sounded like a very basic Wikipedia.
I tried to teach her where “home” and where work is to get traffic details. Her sense of directions was not too well developed.

Hey, babe, I need some music in my life!

As a Prime member, I tried to connect to my Kindle and Prime Music account, but she refused to connect to both.
I live in a non-connected home, so not much to do here; no lights to turn on or off, no heating to adjust.
Another go at some questions and trying to get the music going.
Eventually, she agreed to go for a radio station with reasonable music, and when asked for the latest in baseball she would at least tell me what the Phillies were up to.
I had to figure out how to get her to work; I just had to.
The full manual and the app. I would find answers there.
And answers I found. However, to a completely different question. A question I had not even thought about yet (but was so obvious): Alexa had recorded every single word I had spoken to her!
I tried and delete this history but no chance.
I understand, she needs to learn but why does she have to keep a record of everything!? I mean, you know what I mean, you try all kinds of stupid questions…

Data trouble ahead.

I got concerned. Who’s doing what with my data? The music I ask for, the directions, and not to mention the retrospectively so embarrassing questions I threw at her?
Amazon probably knows more about my life and lifestyle than even myself. Music, movies, literature, food, fashion, you name it. We do not have many shops where I live, and I do not particularly like the crowded town centres on a weekend so ordering in is perfect for me.
But now I was not sure I wanted to add more to “the history of my life”.
Browsing the internet for answers is one thing, and we all know there’s ways to make sure there are no or as little as possible traces.

Are all artificial friends like you, Alexa?

I have not looked into Siri or Google’s voice search, i.e. Google Home (not to mention Microsoft’s Cortana), how they store your audio history (but I guess I should, even though I do not use them a lot) – I just hope it is not as bad as Alexa’s and hopefully slightly more anonymous.
I tried to warm up to what I hoped would become my new BFF but I felt I could not trust her anymore. What if she leaked our conversations?
After a day or two of my life with an artificial BFF I decided I not be ready for this and I sent her back.
Officially because she refused to connect to my music and literature library.
I have to say, I do not miss her.
I can ask Siri for directions, or cooking ideas, or music. She is happy to read out my emails, look something up for me on Google and sometimes shows some personality when she refuses to read the article to me. And maybe getting a Bluetooth speaker would make her happy and encourage better collaboration… Music would sound better, too. If I got her one for Christmas, would that make her my new BFF?

There’s nothing better than a real friend!

Reminds me, I need to call Joni, she is a real BFF, and she can keep a secret. She does not know everything which I am cool with, but when you ask her for advice, she comes up with the real thing, not something she read on Wikipedia.
Got to go, guys, there’s still real life and real people out there, not just Alexas and Siris.