There’s a very impressive free upgrade coming to all Fire-powered devices – including popular Fire TV Sticks – that makes finding things to watch much smarter. With so many streaming apps and so many choices, picking a boxset or tuning into a movie can be a total minefield. According to a recent report from audience measurement firm Nielsen, most of us spend at least 10 minutes searching for content every time we switch our streaming devices on.
Amazon now hopes to fix all that thanks to something called AI-enhanced search which uses clever intelligence, via Alexa, to track things down faster.
Once the update arrives on devices, users will be able to ask for content based on topic, genre, plot, character, actor, and even by quotes. Amazon says it works almost like asking a friend for ideas of things to watch whilst having a beer in the pub.
“This new Fire TV search experience is powered by an Amazon-built large language model (LLM), which enables customers to ask Alexa for personalized TV show and movie recommendations using natural language,” Amazon explained.
As an example, you could say “Alexa, show me movies about dog and human friendships” or “What movie has the line, ‘You’re killing me Smalls?” and you should get an instant and useful response.
If you remember watching a movie and know the plot but can’t remember the name you can also say commands such as “Find the mystery movie set on a private island” or “Show me movies where people get sucked into a video game.”
It’s as simple as that!
Explaining more, Amazon said: “Fire TV now offers a new way to search using Alexa that makes discovering something new to watch more delightful and easy. Fire TV’s new AI-enhanced search combines artificial intelligence with Fire TV’s extensive entertainment content and app library, enabling you to find personalized TV show and movie recommendations using natural language.”
It’s a nice update from the US firm but it appears that only users on the other side of the pond will get access at launch.
“The new Fire TV search experience has begun to roll out to customers in the U.S. in English on select Fire TV devices running FOS6 and later,” Amazon confirmed.
There’s no word on a worldwide release but we’re guessing that more countries will get access to this AI update in the future. Watch this space.