With our accents, fanny packs and typical ignorance of foreign languages, Americans tend to stick out in Europe.
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Meet Amazon Alexa's European alter ego — 8 ways the voice assistant is different in Europe (AMZN)
Amazon changed Alexa for the European market. The company tailored its voice assistant for local cultures and to understand different accents.
Humor — People in other countries often don't find brash or crass humor à la Dodgeball all that funny. So in the UK, Alexa tells jokes about Monty Python. In Germany she tells ones about Trabants, cars with terrible reputations that used to be made in the formerly communist eastern part of the country.
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Amazon tried to make sure Alexa, its voice assistant, would fit in better when it made the leap across the pond.
Before bringing Alexa to consumers in the UK and Germany in September 2016, the team behind the assistant enlisted folks who lived in those countries to help give Alexa a personality makeover. The local teams ensured Alexa's responses were culturally relevant. They offered their insights on what topics locals would want to know about.
And the teams also helped Amazon try to avoid serious cultural missteps, like giving the score for a San Antonio Spurs game rather than the Tottenhan Hotspurs, when someone asks for an update on "the Spurs."
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Here are eight ways Alexa changed when she went abroad:
Humor — People in other countries often don't find brash or crass humor à la Dodgeball all that funny. So in the UK, Alexa tells jokes about Monty Python. In Germany she tells ones about Trabants, cars with terrible reputations that used to be made in the formerly communist eastern part of the country.
Easter Eggs — People in the UK can tell Alexa to "mind the gap." She also understands that "I have a cunning plan" is a catchphrase from the British TV show "Blackadder."
Vocabulary — Americans dropped the "u" from the word "color." But if you ask British Alexa to spell out the word, she'll do it the UK way: "colour."
Dates and Times — Alexa understands that in the UK, Christmas falls on 25 December, not December 25
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Measurements — Europeans would likely toss Alexa out the window if she gave the distance to Paris in miles. So she'll use kilometers instead.
Slang — Blimey! Alexa knows everything is alright if someone says "Bob's your Uncle."
Sports — Alexa can give the latest cricket and Champions League soccer updates.
Events and Holidays — British Alexa can give suggestions for recipes to make on Burn's Night, the holiday celebrating Scottish poet Robert Burns.
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