Amazon's Echo digital assistant is one of its first hardware successes since the Kindle debuted, and now the company is extending the device's reach deeper into Google's territory with Calendar.
Now the helpful voice-controlled assistant can also add events to your Google Calendar.
Simply saying, “Add event to my calendar,” or for example saying, “Add Jennifer’s party to my calendar for Tuesday at 10:00 PM” will now add these events via the Alexa software agent.
Details were revealed in an update on Amazon's website earlier this week.
Before using the feature, you will first need to enable “Google Calendar account linking” in your Alexa app.
While Alexa has been able to read your Google Calendar to help you for some time now, this new creation capability is a bit of a mix-up. Specifically, it means Alexa is starting to encroach on Google's territory, threatening the company's "OK Google" digital assistant for Amazon users who also happen to use Google services.
The Amazon Echo was originally conceived as something to help you shop and consume content offered by Amazon, but planning your day has little to do with commerce (directly). So this, along with new features like ordering an Uber from the Echo, hints at more Echo developments to come.
However, Google isn't sitting on the sidelines while this happens. Recent reports claim that Google is working on its own Amazon Echo competitor.
Meanwhile, the clock has officially started ticking on what other features of Google's digital assistant the Amazon Echo will try to take over in the coming months.
