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Amazon's Alexa just learned to whisper and to bleep your $&@#

Soon, "speechcons" will make your Amazon Echo or Dot sound a little more human and a little less robot.

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Jessica Dolcourt is a passionate content strategist and veteran leader of CNET coverage. As Senior Director of Commerce & Content Operations, she leads a number of teams, including Commerce, How-To and Performance Optimization. Her CNET career began in 2006, testing desktop and mobile software for Download.com and CNET, including the first iPhone and Android apps and operating systems. She continued to review, report on and write a wide range of commentary and analysis on all things phones, with an emphasis on iPhone and Samsung. Jessica was one of the first people in the world to test, review and report on foldable phones and 5G wireless speeds. Jessica began leading CNET's How-To section for tips and FAQs in 2019, guiding coverage of topics ranging from personal finance to phones and home. She holds an MA with Distinction from the University of Warwick (UK).
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The Alexa assistant is getting some new vocal skills.

The Alexa assistant is getting some new vocal skills.

 Chris Monroe/CNET

Pretty soon, Amazon's Alexa assistant is going to get some new speaking skills -- like whispering, shouting and speed-talking, as well as bleeping out naughty words.

Other "speechcons" like this already exist for Alexa in the US, but this set of five new tools will give developers more control over Alexa's volume, intonation and emotion.

(It's all part of SSML, or Speech Synthesis Markup Language, a speech standard.)

Here's what you'll start to hear:

  1. Whispers
  2. Expletive beeps
  3. Substitutions (Alexa will swap a word for the one that's written)
  4. Emphasis (this affects Alexa's speech rate and volume)
  5. "Prosody" (controls volume, pitch, and speech rate)

Users in the UK and Germany will also start being able to get in on the fun. Amazon said it's rolled out speechcons to those countries, which will help Alexa pronounce local phrases with more finesse. Ace!