Amazon Sends 1,700 Alexa Voice Recordings to a Random Person

Post by craftyguy » Fri, Dec 21, 2018, 4:42 AM UTC

marcosdumay wrote: post #239

madrox wrote: post #104

I've never seen a demographic breakdown of HN, but I'm 37 years old. I'm definitely not the oldest guy here, but I see history repeat itself regularly. I remember when people used location tracking as a reason to not own a cell phone. I'm talking about flip phones, mind you, not even iPhones with GPS receivers. I recall the bulk of complaints in that vein died down around the time Google Maps for phones came out. If…

A mobile phone that doesn't leak your position is impossible, but a voice activated assistant that doesn't spy on you on by the orders of some company is pretty much possible.

Post by rapind » Fri, Dec 21, 2018, 4:45 AM UTC

jancsika wrote: post #321

lisper wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a big difference: having a GPS in my phone means I never have to worry about buying or carrying a map with me ever again, at the cost of potentially revealing my location to someone who I'd rather not know it. Having a voice assistant means I don't have to spend a few seconds typing, at the cost of having everything I say potentially overheard by someone who I'd rather didn't hear it. By my quality metric, th…

> Having a voice assistant means I don't have to spend a few seconds typing, at the cost of having everything I say potentially overheard by someone who I'd rather didn't hear it. You're underplaying it in order to artificially inflate your mileage. Having a voice assistant means not having to learn to change application contexts inside an operating system follwed by a few seconds typing. You are ignoring the hundred…

Post by rapind » Fri, Dec 21, 2018, 5:08 AM UTC

saulrh wrote: post #252

dlandis wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Getting a voice assistant was life-changing for me Can you expand on that? In what way?

Compare the workflows for leaving a reminder or note. Before: * Find phone/computer * Unlock * Locate self in interface and navigate to application selector * Invoke note-taking or reminder app * Type in note or reminder * Navigate through tagging/scheduling interface * Commit note/reminder Or: * Locate notebook * Locate writing utensil * Open notebook to current page * Write note * Remember to check notebook every t…

  1. Find phone (Is this really an issue? Haven't they become an extension of our body?)
  2. Unlock phone with thumb (unless of course you're already using it).
  3. Type "make a note to do the thing" into the big text box at the top of your screen.
  4. Preview / confirm it's what you wanted.
  5. Hit "Checkbox" to confirm.

  1. No need to find the phone (assuming it close, which I'd say is a fair assumption).
  2. Say "OK Google".
  3. Say "Make a note to do the thing".
  4. Depending on current coverage, wait while it goes to the cloud to figure out what you mean (annoying).
  5. Listen while it tells you what it did.
  6. Say "Yes" to confirm.

Post by rapind » Fri, Dec 21, 2018, 5:17 AM UTC

ddeck wrote: post #334

rapind wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm with you, until you lost me on: > Now try teaching a non-technical user about cron, its flags, and its relationship to other shell commands, using natural language. I'm just not sure what you mean with this statement. Are you talking about setting up cron jobs via voice? Or are you just making an analogy about the (perceived?) complexity of cron and teaching it to a non-technical user?

I would assume they are saying that it's a whole lot easier for the average person to say: "Please remind me every day at 5pm to water the plants" , or "Please play this song at medium volume every morning at 7am" than to learn how to do the equivalent in whatever operating system their device uses, and I'd tend to agree. Cron is certainly a much higher bar than learning to use the alarm app in your phone, but the po…

Post by codyb » Fri, Dec 21, 2018, 5:37 AM UTC

lisper wrote: post #264

saulrh wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Compare the workflows for leaving a reminder or note. Before: * Find phone/computer * Unlock * Locate self in interface and navigate to application selector * Invoke note-taking or reminder app * Type in note or reminder * Navigate through tagging/scheduling interface * Commit note/reminder Or: * Locate notebook * Locate writing utensil * Open notebook to current page * Write note * Remember to check notebook every t…

* Find phone/computer * Unlock * Locate self in interface and navigate to application selector * Invoke note-taking or reminder app * Type in note or reminder * Navigate through tagging/scheduling interface * Commit note/reminder I just now took a stopwatch to time how long it took me to do all of this: 30 seconds, and 20 of those were walking to my office. That is not a negligible amount of time, but it's not a huge…