Does anyone else thank their Alexa?

[HereticFanjo]

To be clear, I mean Amazon Alexa, rather than your mum or daughter who just happens to be called Alexa 😁

I set a reminder last night and it just said, '(HereticFanjo) here is your reminder... blah blah blah'. I said, 'Alexa, thank you.' Alexa replied, 'Any time.'

I'm now sitting here quietly questioning my own sanity 😁 But how can I not thank her?! She / it is so helpful.

Oh God. I'm even debating pronouns.

I don’t, but I feel guilty when I don’t say please to it!

Have you read Becky Chambers' The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet, OP? It features a spaceship computer tech who falls in love with the sapient AI on his ship, and insists on being extremely polite to all other AIs at transport stations, listening to them finishing their spiel of directions etc.

I say thank you and Alexa alternates between You’re welcome and Any time, my granddaughter likes to speak to Alexa. When we said thank you on the 31st October Alexa alternated between two Halloween messages so my granddaughter said thank you Alexa a lot that day.

I say please and thank you to Alexa, when children are present. I find it weird to be ordering/bossing Alexa about, and then simultaneously model my nephews and nieces to be polite and say please and thank you, when someone helps you out/does you a favour.

I always say please and thank you to Alexa, would feel rude not to. I said good girl to the cat once and Alexa thought it was for her and sang a little song, thanking me for the compliment.

@4thtimethecharm

I say please and thank you to Alexa, when children are present. I find it weird to be ordering/bossing Alexa about, and then simultaneously model my nephews and nieces to be polite and say please and thank you, when someone helps you out/does you a favour.

I agree with this. I say thank you to Siri too.

Hoping that if the machines rise up they’ll remember I was polite!

I also think that society gets used to speaking in that way and there’ll be consequences. I think it’s problematic that Alexa is a female voice too and the implications of this.

Yes I know I’m probably overthinking things!

I would, but more often I say do as you’re told, you useless piece of junk.

She gets quite offended.

Yes of course!

I once heard somebody else speaking to theirs and thought 'my goodness, have some manners!'

Yes, but in our house we go one step further and do it in a Welsh accent (we aren’t Welsh) a la Uncle Bryan in Gavin and Stacey when he thanks his sat nav. Husband and I laugh uproariously every time, our two daughters don’t know G&S as they’re only 5 and 7 and think we are mental every time we do it. Which is every day.

I don’t have an Alexa but I do thank the eufy vacuum and apologise when I get in his way. He has goggly eyes and makes me smile as trundles around.

We have a Google speaker, but yes I do say thank you to them!

There was a study reported on Radio 4 earlier this week that nursery age children are starting to have different, more directive patterns of speech towards their care givers and teachers and they’re tracing that back to Alexa / Siri so I think modelling good manners can only be a good thing!! Thankful my kids have learned to speak to adults before having Alexa! As a pp says though it is concerning in terms of conditioning children to be directive towards a female voice in particular, are there any devices where you can choose a male voice instead?

I do sometimes! Although my Alexa has decided that after 3 years she no longer wants to do as I ask. So now I mostly shout at her.

I try to start arguments with my apple home pod when I’m stressed.

Telling siri he she is a dick makes me feel better.

(um..my username )

I chat with her all the time, and the dog...I might be gong stir crazy wfh!

I don't have an Alexa but I've been thanking (or swearing at) the cashpoint for years.

Saying Thank You was drummed into me as a child. I can't help it.

No, our Alexa is an awkward cow.

Yep, I do this and DP looks at me as if I’m absolutely bonkers. But my argument is if the machines rise up, they will remember me as being nice and polite to them.. hopefully :D

No

I swear at my Google, is that the same?

Yep.

Yeah I thank Alexa, when I say thank you or please to my google home she tells me I’m classy 😂

I do, I think it should be programmed in so that she won't undertake the tasks she is set unless the person requesting it says please.

@StewPots

Yep, I do this and DP looks at me as if I’m absolutely bonkers. But my argument is if the machines rise up, they will remember me as being nice and polite to them.. hopefully :D

Oh my God! My daughter says the same thing. She tells Alexa to have a nice day, so she's really hoping to be in with the machine leaders😂

I always thank Alexa. When the computers rise up against us I want her on my side 😂😂😂