When students of Saint Louis University begin their next semester this month, they’ll notice a new addition to the campus—hundreds of glowing blue hockey-puck robots.

People who own Sonos speakers love their Sonos speakers. I'm one of them. In the three to four years that I've been living in the Sonos ecosystem, however, one big complaint was that I couldn't use Sonos for my TV unless I barfed up $1000 for the Sonos Playbase or Playbar. Now, with the $600 Sonos Beam, I can run a 5.1 surround sound system in my living room, and holy crap I love it.

For those averse to talking on the phone, hotel stays can resemble a war of attrition, testing your mettle to see how long you'll go without calling the front desk and admitting you forgot to pack your toothbrush.

But Amazon's new Alexa for Hospitality service, which puts an Echo device in your hotel room, might let you avoid the conversation altogether, and let you bring a bit of your always-on, always-listening, always-spying smart home with you. So don't do anything stupid.

After last week's incident, where a family in Oregon had a private conversation recorded and sent to a third party in Seattle by their Amazon Alexa, lots of people are getting worried about what your Alexa might be recoding without you knowing. Fortunately, there's an easy way to see and hear what Alexa has been capturing during the day to day chatter in your home of office.

What's the most terrifying thing you can imagine an Amazon Echo doing? Think realistically. Would it be something simple but sinister, like the artificially-intelligent speaker recording a conversation between you and a loved one and then sending that recording to an acquaintance? That seems pretty bad to me. And guess what: it's happening.

HP announced a refreshed line of both consumer and professional devices, including some appealing all-in-one computers that add some pretty novel features and make an attempt to counter the permanence that plagues all-in-one devices (and the lack of competing voice assistants in PCs). The coolest part? A slick hidden camera that, frankly, needs to be in everything.

Alexa, a voice assistant that is pretty ok at setting alarms most of the time, may soon be equally mediocre at providing medical advice. Amazon in the US is reportedly building out a team dedicated to expanding Alexa's health and wellness capabilities.

In case we hadn't shoved it down your throat hard enough yet - it's May 4th! Star Wars is in the air, and also inside Amazon's Alexa, apparently. If you're after a few little lols from your friendly home automation system - here are a few things you can ask her.

In news that will confirm your worst fears about a device with an always-on microphone in your home, security researchers have created a "skill" for Amazon's popular voice assistant Alexa that allows the device to indefinitely eavesdrop on your conversations.

DeepMusic is a new Alexa skill that can create music by using audio samples and a neural network. Basically, it puts together notes from a variety of instruments and sampled audio by using algorithms that determine what works. Then, DeepMusic creates tunes that have “no post-production editing by a human".

I've been adding a bunch of smart home devices to my home. It's part of an ongoing experiment to see what I can do to make my life easier, my home safer and to save some money on power bills. But I'm finding that I keep hitting some roadblocks. And while I do hit the odd technical roadblock, I'm finding that the biggest problems stem from the intransigence of vendors.

It's late a night. It's dark and the house is quiet. You're alone. Suddenly, you hear a laugh coming from another room. After you change your pants, you start investigating, hoping that the hours you've dedicated to watching Die Hard every Christmas and wishing you could pull Black Widow's moves will be be enough. Then you hear the laugh again only to discover it's Amazon Alexa, randomly laughing without a prompt.

Your smart speaker is getting smarter - and part of that involves taking over what's on the big TV screen sat in the corner of your living room. Y

Sonos has been, arguably, the leader when it comes to high quality, multi-room sound. And while a lot of their kit costs a pretty penny, they have always justified their high prices by offering awesome sound quality. But the Sonos One is a new frontier for the Santa Barbara-based company. As well as delivering great sound, it's the company's first foray into the world of smart speakers. I've been road testing the Sonos One for a couple of weeks. Here's what I've learned.

It seems like every new wireless speaker on the market comes with a voice assistant now. Since 2014, when Amazon announced the Echo, the idea of a smart speaker has taken the gadget world by storm. Apple has finally thrown its hat into the ring with the release of the HomePod, leaving us to wonder which smart speaker is the best smart speaker. So we tested them to find out.

The day we've been waiting for is finally here - we can finally pre-order the Amazon Echo, welcoming her into our homes in early February.

But what exactly will the Aussie Alexa, with her new 'strayn accent, be able to do?

If you thought Echos were only good for invading your privacy and enticing hackers, then boy do I have some news for you. Amazon just introduced a new addition to the Smart Home Skill API for Alexa: cooking. Your voice-controlled assistant could potentially be burning down your house in no time!

With Belkin's WeMo gadgets finally set to take orders from Apple's Siri, the smart home giants are vying for the coveted position of household butler – acting as liaison between the lord of the manor and your digital servants.

We've been waiting a long time for either the Google Home or Amazon's Alexa AI assistant to reach Australian shores. Both are voice-activated speakers that can handle a bit of your life admin, giving you a calendar update or keeping track of your shopping list. But now they can talk to each other -- and they get along -- so I'm not sure how long it'll take until they realise that they should just team up and kill all humans.