Amazon's Alexa is the everyday hero of household life in new ad campaign

It may not be immediately obvious why one should choose to put a computerized talking cylinder in charge of various household tasks. Amazon is doing its best job of explaining with a new series of short of vignettes in which Alexa, the digital assistant programmed into its Echo device, solves a succession of everyday domestic conundrums. SEE ALSO: Apple's Echo rival could make Siri the master of your home The spots manage to convey a lot in these brief bursts of life, despite the only dialogue being a question or request posed to the gadget and a subsequent robotic reply. In one, for instance, a proud mom asks Alexa whether it's supposed to rain as she watches her son chalk an impressive mural on the front driveway. Another consists only of a woman requesting that her butterfly's birthday be added to her calendar.