"Life Bot solves this by bringing the most-used features under one voice app."
The most used features are able to be asked to Alexa directly.
Are you helping users that may not want to set up IFTTT triggers for actions?
Launch HN: Life Bot (YC S17) – Voice app to help with daily activities
11–20 of 40 posts
Re: Launch HN: Life Bot (YC S17) – Voice app to help with daily activities
#12"Life Bot solves this by bringing the most-used features under one voice app." The most used features are able to be asked to Alexa directly. Are you helping users that may not want to set up IFTTT triggers for actions?
You're right that Alexa does a lot of these features natively, but what we're trying to do is make each one better for users.
For example with reminders, we allow users to get notified of the reminders they set where ever they are via SMS. Or for news we give users the option of texting the full article to their phone.
Right now we're starting with simple productivity features, but going forward we want to make it easier for Alexa users to interact with other third party services without having to enable a whole bunch of different Skills.
IFTTT is a great service but a lot of Alexa users aren't familiar with it.
Re: Launch HN: Life Bot (YC S17) – Voice app to help with daily activities
#13Why? What problem is this solving?
Right now, the biggest problem Life Bot solves for Alexa users is that we bring voice reminders out of the home - If you set a reminder using Alexa, it's only useful if you're around the device to hear it go off. Life Bot sends you your reminder via SMS so where ever you are you'll get it! As we add more productivity features to Life Bot, we're also removing the need for user's to remember multiple invocation names f…
Cross platform is a selling point for me at least.
Will you integrate with standard calendar technology? E.g. caldav etc?
I'm still not convinced that voice is a platform - it seems like more of a feature to me...
Re: Launch HN: Life Bot (YC S17) – Voice app to help with daily activities
#14Do you have a website? Am interested to learn more but I don't have any Alexa-enabled devices, so I can't really use your link.
Yes you can find more info at http://www.asklifebot.com Right now we're just on Alexa but will be coming to other platforms very soon!
wrong twitter link on your home page
Re: Launch HN: Life Bot (YC S17) – Voice app to help with daily activities
#15Earlier quoted context omitted.
Right now, the biggest problem Life Bot solves for Alexa users is that we bring voice reminders out of the home - If you set a reminder using Alexa, it's only useful if you're around the device to hear it go off. Life Bot sends you your reminder via SMS so where ever you are you'll get it! As we add more productivity features to Life Bot, we're also removing the need for user's to remember multiple invocation names f…
Cross platform is a selling point for me at least. Will you integrate with standard calendar technology? E.g. caldav etc? I'm still not convinced that voice is a platform - it seems like more of a feature to me...
Yes calendar integration will be included in the next release - we're going to start with Google Calendar but will add more of the most popular calendar services as we go.
I'm not 100% familiar with caldav but will look into it!
In terms of voice as a feature vs. platform - I think right now it appears to many to be a feature, because the quality and capability of voice apps is just not that great. Most voice apps offer a sub-set of the functionality available on mobile or web, so from a phycological point of view when you use one it feels like just a small (and often not as good) feature of the main product. However as the accuracy of the underlying speech to text and natural language understanding of these platforms gets better, and as the capability of voice apps gets better, we see voice becoming a much more easy and natural way for people to access their favourite products, services, and content.
Whenever you want something, you'll just ask your assistant, and because you may be using multiple platforms, we think Life Bot will be the best way to do this that maintains the context of what you like / don't like.
Definitely still early days though - but that's the vision!
Re: Launch HN: Life Bot (YC S17) – Voice app to help with daily activities
#16Re: Launch HN: Life Bot (YC S17) – Voice app to help with daily activities
#17"Life Bot solves this by bringing the most-used features under one voice app." The most used features are able to be asked to Alexa directly. Are you helping users that may not want to set up IFTTT triggers for actions?
You're right that Alexa does a lot of these features natively, but what we're trying to do is make each one better for users. For example with reminders, we allow users to get notified of the reminders they set where ever they are via SMS. Or for news we give users the option of texting the full article to their phone. Right now we're starting with simple productivity features, but going forward we want to make it ea…
"For example with reminders, we allow users to get notified of the reminders they set where ever they are via SMS."
This was my #1 most desired feature!! Thank you
Re: Launch HN: Life Bot (YC S17) – Voice app to help with daily activities
#18Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're right that Alexa does a lot of these features natively, but what we're trying to do is make each one better for users. For example with reminders, we allow users to get notified of the reminders they set where ever they are via SMS. Or for news we give users the option of texting the full article to their phone. Right now we're starting with simple productivity features, but going forward we want to make it ea…
"For example with reminders, we allow users to get notified of the reminders they set where ever they are via SMS." This was my #1 most desired feature!! Thank you
No worries! Great to hear!! :)
If there's anything else you'd like to see added just let me know at om@asklifebot.com
Re: Launch HN: Life Bot (YC S17) – Voice app to help with daily activities
#19Do you have a website? Am interested to learn more but I don't have any Alexa-enabled devices, so I can't really use your link.
Yes you can find more info at http://www.asklifebot.com Right now we're just on Alexa but will be coming to other platforms very soon!
I would be most interested in running this on my Linux desktop. I will not allow Alexa or any other closed-source cloud-connected sensors in my home for security reasons.
Re: Launch HN: Life Bot (YC S17) – Voice app to help with daily activities
#20Cool! Installed :D