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Amazon’s Alexa answered a lot of questions on Thanksgiving that had nothing to do with food

Image Credit: Ethan Lofton

Amazon’s Alexa spent a lot of time fielding questions this Thanksgiving — about cooking and a whole range of other topics — an Amazon spokesperson told VentureBeat.

“Customers asked Alexa to set nearly twice as many timers on Thanksgiving Day as the day before. And customers asked Alexa nearly 3x as many questions about cooking during Thanksgiving week compared to the week prior,” Amazon wrote in a statement shared with VentureBeat.

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The spokesperson did not share just how many questions people asked Alexa-enabled devices but said questions and commands increased 356 percent this Thanksgiving compared to last year.

Interestingly, Alexa users were more interested in things like music than they were in turkey prep or pie recipes.

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The top five Thanksgiving Day questions and requests:

“Alexa, what time is it?”
“Alexa, tell me a joke.”
“Alexa, play Christmas music.”
“Alexa, what’s the weather?”
“Alexa, tell me a Thanksgiving joke.”

Alexa owners asked for “upbeat, dance tracks for their gatherings with family and friends,” the statement said.

The five most requested songs were:

“Jingle Bells”
“Juju on that Beat” by Zay Hilfigerrr and Zayion McCall
“Alice’s Restaurant” by Arlo Guthrie
“Can’t Stop the Feeling” by Justin Timberlake
“Uptown Funk” by Bruno Mars and Mark Ronson

The five most requested holiday songs were:

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“Jingle Bells”
“Jingle Bell Rock”
“The Christmas Song”
“It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year”
“Feliz Navidad”

In the days prior to Thanksgiving, the results of a survey found that more than 40 percent of Amazon Echo owners use the device for music.

The survey was conducted by Consumer Intelligence Research Partners(CIRP).

“CIRP estimates that for US Amazon customers, awareness of Amazon Echo increased to 69 percent as of Sept. 30, 2016, up from 20% as of March 31, 2015, the first full quarter following its introduction,” CIRP said in a statement.

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Amazon has sold 5.1 million Amazon Echos since the device was introduced in late 2014, according to CIRP estimates.

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