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HomePod arrives February 9, available to order this Friday

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Re: HomePod arrives February 9, available to order this Friday

#11

Post by the_gastropod »

BadassFractal wrote: post #3

Will be interesting to see a feature comparison with all of the other existing voice-controlled speakers out there. Seems like a couple of recent blogs posts linked on HN were saying that Apple was starting already behind the competition in this space.

Apple is rarely first to market for anything. They didn't release the first mp3 player, they released the best one. They didn't come out with the first smart phone, first tablet, or first smart watch, either. They rarely shine in feature-to-feature comparisons, either. The iPhone did less than the blackberries it destroyed. It just did the important things better.

It will be interesting to see how the Homepod plays out. If it's successful, it almost certainly won't be because it out-features the competition. And they almost certainly haven't lost because they weren't first to market.

Re: HomePod arrives February 9, available to order this Friday

#12

Post by matthewmacleod »

ratsimihah wrote: post #2

What’s innovative about this? I feel like I’m reading an Amazon Alexa or Google Home ad.

I don’t think it’s particularly intended to be innovative. The thing is, the existing options aren’t that great either for various reasons. This might be pretty good if you are in the apple ecosystem.

Re: HomePod arrives February 9, available to order this Friday

#14

Post by MBCook »

germinalphrase wrote: post #6

I feel exited about home assistants in the same way I am excited about home automation: the premise seems useful in a general way, but I struggle to think of use cases that have a meaningful effect on my lifestyle. Also - I can't shake the privacy concerns.

Good news. The BomePod really appears to be a high quality speaker that they were forced to shove Siri functionality into.

No one is buying $350 home assistants, but if it’s a really high quality speaker (we’ll see) then the price is reasonable.

The marketing around it is really weird and confused. At this point I wonder what Apple even thinks it is.

Re: HomePod arrives February 9, available to order this Friday

#15

Post by jvolkman »

germinalphrase wrote: post #6

I feel exited about home assistants in the same way I am excited about home automation: the premise seems useful in a general way, but I struggle to think of use cases that have a meaningful effect on my lifestyle. Also - I can't shake the privacy concerns.

Yesterday I said "hey google, turn on the kitchen lights" because my hands were full and the switch was across the room. I wouldn't say it had a meaningful effect on my lifestyle, but it was useful at that moment.

Re: HomePod arrives February 9, available to order this Friday

#16

Post by konradb »

e1ven wrote: post #10
ratsimihah wrote: post #2

What’s innovative about this? I feel like I’m reading an Amazon Alexa or Google Home ad.

I’m interested in one as a new speaker. I don’t expect I’ll enable Siri. I want to use it as an AirPlay target. I was previously considering a Sonos, but the Airplay2 support will be baked into the OS so I don’t need to use a clunky 3rd party app.

Although presumably with Airplay 2 you would still need your phone to play the music from, where with Sonos, once it was playing, you wouldn't need your phone as the speakers themselves would have the music. Though that might not be useful for your use-case.

Re: HomePod arrives February 9, available to order this Friday

#17

Post by MBCook »

the_gastropod wrote: post #11
BadassFractal wrote: post #3

Will be interesting to see a feature comparison with all of the other existing voice-controlled speakers out there. Seems like a couple of recent blogs posts linked on HN were saying that Apple was starting already behind the competition in this space.

Apple is rarely first to market for anything. They didn't release the first mp3 player, they released the best one. They didn't come out with the first smart phone, first tablet, or first smart watch, either. They rarely shine in feature-to-feature comparisons, either. The iPhone did less than the blackberries it destroyed. It just did the important things better. It will be interesting to see how the Homepod plays o…

I agree with everything you said about Apple’s MO.

But this thing is expensive. Siri almost seems grafted on (they wouldn’t even let people try it at the announcement) to a speaker that was already in development.

I wonder if this will be the iPod HiFi 2.0. Sounds great, too expensive, no one cares.

I’m curious about it but have no real interest in it as a speaker or assistant.

Reviews should prove interesting.

Re: HomePod arrives February 9, available to order this Friday

#18

Post by dljsjr »

ratsimihah wrote: post #2

What’s innovative about this? I feel like I’m reading an Amazon Alexa or Google Home ad.

Apple has been pretty up-front from the start that they don't want to make the best possible home assistant, they want to make a really incredible speaker that has home assistant stuff built-in.

Whether the "incredible speaker" part is true remains to be seen since the thing hasn't released yet but you can look at a lot of the features and they're very music-focused.

It's more competing with a Sonos than it is with an Alexa in my mind, the Siri stuff is just lagniappe.

Re: HomePod arrives February 9, available to order this Friday

#19

Post by [deleted] »

e1ven wrote: post #10
ratsimihah wrote: post #2

What’s innovative about this? I feel like I’m reading an Amazon Alexa or Google Home ad.

I’m interested in one as a new speaker. I don’t expect I’ll enable Siri. I want to use it as an AirPlay target. I was previously considering a Sonos, but the Airplay2 support will be baked into the OS so I don’t need to use a clunky 3rd party app.

[deleted]
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