Here are the other names Jeff Bezos pitched for Alexa, including Samantha and Friday — and Amazon (AMZN)

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These days, it's hard to remember a time before Alexa, Amazon's all-knowing voice assistant. 

But "Alexa" wasn't the first name Jeff Bezos and his team at Amazon came up with back in the early 2010s, according to Brad Stone's new book, "Amazon Unbound: Jeff Bezos and the Invention of a Global Empire."

According to Stone, Bezos was passionate about building a smart computer that users could control with their voice, which is what led to the creation of the first Amazon Echo device. Early on, the team realized they needed a "wake word" that would make the device start listening. The word would need to have three syllables, a "distinct combination of phonemes" so as not to unnecessarily rouse the device, and an easily marketable name, like Apple's Siri. 

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In order to figure out a name, the team wrote ideas down on flash cards that were spread across a conference room table for Bezos to peruse, according to Stone.

Bezos had his own suggestions, including:

• Finch, the name of a fantasy book by author Jeff VenderMeer
• Friday, the name of the personal assistant in "Robinson Crusoe" 
• Samantha, the main character from "Bewitched," a show about a witch who marries a mortal and uses her powers to complete household tasks
• Amazon, which Bezos believed could help fuel feelings of goodwill toward the company

Bezos was also reportedly disappointed that his mother's name, Jacklyn, wasn't more "mellifluous" and was therefore "too harsh" to be considered. 

Ultimately, Amazon decided on Alexa, which was also Bezos' idea: It's an homage to the library of Alexandria, Egypt, which was one of the largest centers for knowledge and learning in ancient times.

These days, Alexa has been installed in devices ranging from the Echo Show, Amazon's first device with a video screen, the miniature sized Echo Dot, and Amazon's Echo Buds, wireless earbuds with Alexa built in. Nearly 70% of smart-speaker owners in the US own an Echo device versus one of Amazon's competitors, like Google. Amazon doesn't break out sales figures for its Echo devices, but the company said in early 2019 that it has sold 100 million Alexa-enabled devices.

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See Also:

• Jeff Bezos used to test Amazon's Echo Show by asking Alexa to play videos mocking Trump
• Amazon trained Alexa in secret by hiring unsuspecting people to ask questions in a room filled with hidden prototypes
• Jeff Bezos once got so frustrated with Alexa's lack of intelligence that he told Alexa to 'shoot yourself' — and Amazon's engineers heard it