A couple have decided to rename their daughter to prevent confusing their newly installed Amazon Echo device. John and Carol Dick of Bromley, Kent described the ensuing chaos every time they asked Amazon’s virtual assistant “Alexa” a question. “I’d go ‘Alexa, what will the weather be like tomorrow’ and then our Alexa would come into the room and say something daft like ‘I don’t know daddy, marshmallows?’ It was driving me bloody nuts and I was on the verge of returning it when Carol had the brilliant idea of changing our Alexa’s name. I mean she’s only 4 so not all that attached to it and the hassle to change her name by deed poll is worth it to be able to order a take away by voice command only; yeah a bit like the phone but waaay cooler.

“The only problem,” Mr Dick explained, “is coming up with a name that is unlikely to be used in other future smart voice-activated products which is why we finally settled on ‘Fannie’. Yeah we know Fannie Dick will probably raise a couple of giggles at class assembly but this is a seriously cool bit of kit and whatshername is totally fine with it.”