Your Amazon Echo can now read out tweets for you

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If you've always felt like Twitter needed more in the way of voice control and response, good news: the platform has announced its very own Amazon Alexa skill, which means the digital assistant app can read out trends, tweets, notifications and more for you.

Alexa originally appeared on the Amazon Echo but is starting to spread to more platforms and devices, including the latest set of tablets from the online retail giant. If you've got an Echo at home you don't need to lift a finger to find out who's been @replying you.

While Twitter hasn't published a full list of commands, they seem to be pretty straightforward: "Alexa, ask Twitter has anyone retweeted me?" and "Alexa, ask Twitter for my mentions?" are two of the inputs available to you.

Speak up at the back

You can also look up trends across Twitter as a whole or for a specific area, and get the latest tweets from your timeline by saying "Alexa, ask Twitter what is happening?" It doesn't look like you can send tweets through your Echo yet though.

Those of you outside the US could be getting your hands on Echo speakers very soon, as Amazon is expected to announce UK availability on 14 September at a special press event in London. When it turns up, there'll be a new Alexa skill on offer.

Earlier this year Amazon announced there are more than 1,000 skills (sets of voice commands) available through Alexa, although their quality varies: you can use your Echo to do everything from get the weather forecast to order an Uber.

• Amazon may take on Microsoft's Cortana with Alexa voice assistant for PCs

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