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The Echo Dot was the best-selling product on Amazon this holiday season

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Re: The Echo Dot was the best-selling product on Amazon this holiday season

#161

Post by linker3000 »

mewse wrote: post #146
melling wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Hey Google” is the same number of syllables as Alexa.

Also the same number as "Hey, Siri". And Samsung's "Hey, Bixby". I'm assuming it's not a coincidence. I think it's likely that three syllables just happens to be a nice cut-off point that minimizes the number of spurious activations, and that explains why everybody doing voice control uses that particular threshold to activate their digital assistant. Heck, even Star Trek got it right way back in 1966 with its "Compu…

Just be glad that VMware don't make one.

"Hey, VMware vSphere Home Voice Assistant Essentials Plus..."

Re: The Echo Dot was the best-selling product on Amazon this holiday season

#162

Post by toyg »

andy_ppp wrote: post #103

Can we be absolutely certain that everything before “Ok, Google” or “Alexa” isn’t being recorded, by the companies or by back doors created by the security services? Seems too much like a telescreen for my liking. The problem is I would love one I could trust!

> Can we be absolutely certain that everything before “Ok, Google” or “Alexa” isn’t being recorded

You can be absolutely certain everything is being recorded, if anything as a statistical datapoint to improve voice recognition.

Whether this stuff will get its way to the security services depends almost entirely on whether such services find it useful (the other relevant parameter is the country market-size, i.e. how costly it would be for manufacturers not to comply with requests).

Re: The Echo Dot was the best-selling product on Amazon this holiday season

#163

Post by baby »

touristtam wrote: post #144
JulianRaphael wrote: post #121

Very revealing discussion. Most of the participants just argue about Amazon vs. Google here, some fear surveillance, some consider the devices useless, a few want to understand if the HN crowd finds it useful. This is something I notice here on HN in product-related discussions more and more: people just say what THEY think about product X (typically a negative opinion or complaint), rather being creative, constructi…

General public has probably been sold on the potential & novelty of the device, without realizing how little there is to it (feature wise). It feels like it is similar to VR and personal drones; it sounds exiting, but it isn't that practical in everyday setting to replace other activities, and setting it up can feel tedious.

wait, VR is freaking awesome, please don't put it in the same box.

Re: The Echo Dot was the best-selling product on Amazon this holiday season

#164

Post by thg »

dingaling wrote: post #136
thg wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could sniff the network connection and see whether it is sending anything home. Of course you'd have to do that again after every update and you wouldn't know if it doesn't activate silent recording for specific key words. If you want a voice assistant you can trust, you have to build your own out of open hardware and software and run your own hosted service for it, but the thing being hacked would still be a pos…

> You could sniff the network connection and see whether it is sending anything home Not really practical with a pinned internal CA and batched uploading.

> Not really practical with a pinned internal CA and batched uploading.

It's not so much about looking at the payload than it is about whether it's sending anything at all and if it is, what amount. Correct me if I'm wrong, but from everything I've read and heard these devices don't really have much in the way of internal storage capacity (yet). It either has to be uploaded or discarded.

Re: The Echo Dot was the best-selling product on Amazon this holiday season

#165

Post by always_good »

smileysteve wrote: post #24
fermienrico wrote: post #7

Google is miles ahead in terms of a conversational assistant. There is a lot of friction in using voice activated services. If I have a choice of typing "Weather in XXXXX zip" in the address bar vs. asking an assistant, I choose the former. Therefore, every time I use anything else but Google, I am afraid it won't recognize my command and I immediately feel like throwing that thing out of the window. I need to be 100…

I got a google home solely because it came w/ a hue package and tried to show it to my family. The Home couldn't hear me over itself (music) across the kitchen... My alexa can hear what I'm saying down the corridor with the shower on and much louder. It was embarassing

I'm curious, why did the package size matter?

Re: The Echo Dot was the best-selling product on Amazon this holiday season

#166

Post by IgorPartola »

k__ wrote: post #149
blensor wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While those devices are far from perfect they are an evolutionary step in how people are able to interact with technology. My mother in law does not use a computer or smartphone at all, but she loves to use the Echo because it provides a familiar interface (speech) to services she would use (music, weather, casual information search). And interacting with voice assistants is a two way street in my opinion. They will…

Interesting. We have an Echo and to this day we haven't found any use for it. Talking is broadcast and most of the time we search stuff for ourself on mobile. Also, it often simply says it has no answer.

Smart home control: “Alexa turn the lights on.”

News.

Kitchen timers.

Music control.

These are my most popular uses.

Re: The Echo Dot was the best-selling product on Amazon this holiday season

#168

Post by paul7986 »

I’m eagerly awaiting when either Google Home or Alexa show/display your query via projection on your various walls/surfaces in your house. The info appears/projects onto walls and other surfaces and remains for a few minutes.

They have the Amazon Show but you have to be up close and it’s only in one room. I want my digital info/queries to be seen and accessible by just looking up wherever i am in my home.

Re: The Echo Dot was the best-selling product on Amazon this holiday season

#169

Post by blensor »

k__ wrote: post #149
blensor wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While those devices are far from perfect they are an evolutionary step in how people are able to interact with technology. My mother in law does not use a computer or smartphone at all, but she loves to use the Echo because it provides a familiar interface (speech) to services she would use (music, weather, casual information search). And interacting with voice assistants is a two way street in my opinion. They will…

Interesting. We have an Echo and to this day we haven't found any use for it. Talking is broadcast and most of the time we search stuff for ourself on mobile. Also, it often simply says it has no answer.

If you create a custom skill you can do almost anything.

Here is our fun little project for Halloween https://youtu.be/BdbjoniAP0s

Re: The Echo Dot was the best-selling product on Amazon this holiday season

#170

Post by ygra »

Mindwipe wrote: post #105
megablast wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, since Microsoft didn’t show any ads for google. I think Microsoft might be pissed if google started hosting free copies of their software on their servers.

And allowed downloads, putting Google at billions of dollars in liabilities on their music license agreements.

Funnily enough, MetroTube does both as well and continues to work.
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