Amazon Alexa adds kid-friendly skills, lets your child play with SpongeBob and Elmo

We haven’t really seen kid-related skills because of strict child privacy protection laws but Amazon has found a way to comply with the laws and encourage a new set of users to keep using its smart assistant and home speakers. The new Alexa skills rolling out in the US first will let kids play a SpongeBob game and an Elmo-related skill are debuting alongside a new Verified Parental Consent feature, where parents will need to approve use of the features via the Alexa companion app the first time the “kid skill” is enabled. Parents or guardians will need to enter a one-time password via SMS or phone or verify by credit card. It’s a one-time approval process. This new feature is sure to entice more companies itching to reach out to a younger demographic. And making it easier for children to access this tech will make them more reliant on them in the future

The new skills include a SpongeBob SquarePants game where kids need to take and relay increasingly difficult food orders to the staff that include the likes of SpongeBob, Squidward, and Mr. Krabs. For the Sesame Street’s skill, you get to play hide-and-seek with Elmo using audio clues to find out where he’s hiding. You can also practice the alphabet. On top of that, Amazon is launching its own Storytime skills that can read bedtime stories to kids from ages 5 to 12. The collection features stories read by Saturday Night Live’s Aidy Bryant and Tom Kenny, the voice of SpongeBob SquarePants.

Source: TechCrunch