.png)
The voice assistant’s working title and wake-word is currently “Beeb,” and it will be built into the BBC’s website, its iPlayer app and other mobile apps, and made available to manufacturers who want to incorporate the British broadcaster’s software.
The BBC said it had no plans to launch a Beeb hardware device, but the voice assistant is being designed to work on existing smart speakers and smart TVs that include the iPlayer app.
BBC staff around the UK will be recording their voices to help train the assistant to recognize different British accents, something that U.S. voice assistants have been known to struggle with.
The BBC said having its own assistant would enable it to “experiment with new programs, features and experiences without someone else’s permission to build it in a certain way.”
“Much like we did with BBC iPlayer, we want to make sure everyone can benefit from this new technology, and bring people exciting new content, programs and services – in a trusted, easy-to-use way,” said a BBC spokesman.
According to The Guardian, from the end of the month BBC radio stations will no longer be available on the popular TuneIn radio app, which is also used by Amazon’s Alexa, because the U.S. company refused to share information on listeners of BBC stations.
Instead, the BBC wants people to access its content through BBC apps or via Alexa, in the hope that people log in and it can better understand what people are consuming.
