You laugh but it is a seriously good thing. I mentioned the 'side project' I had submitted that Google legal had rejected, it was combining Siri with timers and cooking facts as the ultimate kitchen timer. As the GP points out, there are a bazillion factoids you might consult while cooking and a huge win for cooking is having everything come out at the same time (co-ordinating timers) so as an app on your phone following you around in your pocket it can be pretty killer.

Given how badly people screw chicken up on a regular basis, I'm not even seeing the problem here, and I'm usually the one to shout Skynet during an otherwise reasonable discussion on AI.

Fucking up food is a sin.

Dave needs to get a food thermometer.

No. A billion dollar system that is so accessible that it's not even insane to connect a simple kitchen timer to it.

Sci-fi got it wrong with their humorous stupid robots providing comic relief while smart robots do the work. All the robots are the same smart, and getting better every day.

I could see Alexa married to a Kindle with a kickstand being a killer kitchen tool.