Why everyone needs a virtual cheerleader
How to make your home assistant play intro music for you, keeping you cheerful and annoying your housemates.
When I walk into my living room, my Google Home plays a randomised hype music track, like the theme from Rocky, as if I was a boxer or skinny wrestler. This is a fantastic way for me to start the day feeling positive and it also winds up my housemate, so double-win. In today’s short post I’m going to explain how I did it and why you should try having a virtual cheerleader.
Although with Dialogueflow, Google is making it insanely easy for non-technical people to build Assistant apps, I actually fudged this together without any tools or programming knowledge. Here’s how:
Ingredients
2 Google Homes in separate rooms (one will do though)
1 mobile device with the Google Assistant app (I used my iPhone)
1 Spotify Playlist of songs that are punchy in the first 3 seconds (here’s one I made to get you going)
1 dressing gown with a hood
1 door to burst through
1 person that you like to annoy
Instructions
Step 1: Create or follow that Spotify playlist, so Google knows what to play.
Step 2: Open up the Google Assistant app and navigate to the ‘Your Stuff’ section (on iOS, this is via the little blue icon on the top right).
Step 3: Type or paste the following into your shortcuts:
When I say…
‘Intro me’ (or whatever command you like)
The Google Assistant should…
‘Shuffle the playlist <playlist name> on Living Room’
(‘Living Room’ is the name of the Google Home in my living room)
Step 4: Test it out. You may want to try different commands that come naturally to you and don’t confuse Ms Google.
Step 5: Wait until the morning, put on your dressing gown and use the command on your second device.
Step 6: Make your entrance to the living room like the unstoppable champ that you are!
This (fairly puerile) exercise got me thinking about another role that a virtual assistant can play (last week’s was a wise old butler): that of an eternally supportive friend. It doesn’t matter what you do, your assistant will listen to you and provide encouragement.
In this example, all I’ve done is create some automation, so I’m effectively cheering myself on. Yup, this is a pre-programmed gift from past Andrew to present Andrew to say ‘keep it up man’. Nothing wrong with a bit of self-cheering!
But what if, in the future, your assistant device asked you or sensed how you were feeling? Tracking moods and keeping thought diaries help a lot of people to get through the ups and downs of life. There are plenty of apps out there that do this and it feels like voice is a logical progression.
As long as privacy is taken care of, this could be a low friction way to record how you are feeling then, unburdened, burst into the kitchen to Eye of the Tiger (feeling like Glen, below).
Thanks for reading! Who’s already thinking and writing about AI metaphors? Is there a smarter way to set up my intro music on Google Home? I’d love to find out more. Find me on Twitter or LinkedIn.
