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Amazon Dash Button

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Re: Amazon Dash Button

#471

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I have to approve orders on my phone as the video suggests, I may as well create the order then and there. Something about that video (and much of my opinion is based on the video and look of the product) makes me uneasy. It's suggesting my life is a series of purchases and top-ups, and I will be happier when I can click my branded button. Like a junkie or something. When the woman runs out of coffee it looks like…

Come now, you can't tell me that you've gone to use $PRODUCT_NAME, only to realize that it's out/almost out. We all forget to replenish our stock once in a while. This seems like a great product for the post-college individual, living away on their own for the first time (i.e. me). Heck, I know already that I'm low on detergent, yet I keep forgetting to go to the store to pick up more. Obviously that's my fault, but…

> Though, I'm still not totally convinced that this isn't an April Fool's joke that's a day early

Spoken like someone who thinks there's a single timezone on the planet.

Re: Amazon Dash Button

#472

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or you'll have to set up your MyWhirlpool account on their website so that you can pair their app on your iPhone with your washing machine so you can search their incomplete list of detergent brands and add your second choice to your MyWhirlpoolBrandSelect Favorites List and then give up when Amazon seems to stop supporting that brand.

It would be easier to just wash my fucking dishes.

I find it frustrating to wash dishes in the washing machine as well.

Re: Amazon Dash Button

#473
post #316

I think this is great! Some may complain about all of the branding in their house, but the branding is already there. You have packages of Tide, Bounty, Clorox, etc. You can just place these buttons where you store the products. I'd imagine a column of them stuck to the inside of a cabinet door.

I have started removing the labels from branded products as much as possible: shampoo, face wash, soap, bleach. I like the simplicity. I avoid wearing branded clothes as much as possible. The last thing I would do is put an advertisement for P&G in my home, but I am clearly in the minority.

Interesting. I'd say you're definitely in the minority :) Clothes I can understand, but removing branding from something like a bottle of bleach that spends most of it's life out of sight seems like wasted effort. That could just be me though.

Re: Amazon Dash Button

#474

Earlier quoted context omitted.

| but I can't help but scream "why??" Because it's a tangible reminder that you need to buy new X and it removes all the barriers entirely to that. It's wildly convenient. Might I remind you: - Locate mobile device - Swipe/Unlock mobile device - Locate Safari App/Amazon app - Tap and wait for Safari to load - Access amazon.com - Type in 'X' - Locate results and click on option - Press 'one click purchase' for irony v…

Half of those steps would be eliminated if Amazon would simply add a "favorites" or "regular items" panel to their mobile app, where all the "buttons" for the items you regularly need would be displayed, and you could just tap on one to re-order it. Given the fact that people almost always have their smartphone with them now, having a separate external button for every product is ridiculously redundant.

The time I'm least likely to have my phone with me is when doing things like starting the laundry, or starting the dishwasher, or grabbing the last soda in the fridge, or similar stuff around the house, where I may have left the phone somewhere else in the house.

Pretty much every other time the phone will be in my pocket and the value would be less. But even then it'd mean fishing my phone out, unlocking, starting an app instead of just pushing a button. Not torture by any means, but if I can just stick a button there and not have to think about it again, then awesome.

Re: Amazon Dash Button

#475

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I already don't question my habits for paper towels or laundry detergent. I buy the same ones every time because it works and it's not worth optimizing the $20 of paper towels or detergent I'll buy every 6 months.

Maybe you're right about those particular things (but maybe in a dystopian future you would because the interference with competition drove the price up into local maxima). Seriously though, do I question my habits when buying food, drinks and coffee. This video is saying "you can lock yourself into a cycle of dependence on this one brand of coffee and this one brand of water and this one brand of cheap unhealthy rea…

Why all of this talk about a dystopian future? I can choose to refill on a particular brand of paper towels without giving up my right to choose what I eat. This entire thread is full of absurdity.

Re: Amazon Dash Button

#476
post #456

This is clearly an April fools campaign. This approach is simply not the most viable. How many buttons are you going to have in your household? How are you going to protect it from kids etc!

Are you willing to bet it's an April Fools' joke? If you're not willing to bet, you don't really believe in it. I'll wager $200 against your $20 that it's not an April Fool's joke. Before you give me your money, consider: * You can have as many buttons as you want. They want you to have as many buttons as you can have. They have hooks and adhesive, which means you can basically have a button physically on every produ…

You had me convinced at 'real solution is to not have children'. While this is a compelling social message, I don't believe Amazon would knowingly, consciously, commit to such a message.

Quod erat demonstrandum ... it's an April Fools'.

Re: Amazon Dash Button

#477

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How often do you need laundry detergent? Every two weeks? If this button saves you ten seconds each time, that's a total of 4.3 minutes per year saved. And that assumes you buy the stuff one at a time instead of getting a bunch at once. Eh about once every 2 months. It's taken me 2 weeks so far to remember to get it. I go to the store almost daily. :(

That seems like a pretty solvable behavioral problem. I hesitate to recommend using some todo application since todo apps have turned into kind of a joke in the last few years, but.. maybe try using a todo app?

Why use a todo app that requires me to grab my phone, unlock, start an app and enter a todo item, when I could instead just press a button that'll be right in front of me at the moment I notice I'll need more of some product soon?

Re: Amazon Dash Button

#478
Whatever you do, keep it out of the reach of kids...

Thankfully by default it only registers the fist press, till delivery resets it. But if you have one for many things and a kid goes on a tear...

Re: Amazon Dash Button

#479

Harper's Magazine, September 1996: > From an interview with Kurt Vonnegut in the November 1995 issue of Inc. Technology. Vonnegut was asked to discuss his feelings about living in an increasingly computerized world. >> I work at home, and if I wanted to, I could have a computer right by my bed, and I'd never have to leave it. But I use a typewriter, and afterward I mark up the pages with a pencil. Then I call up this…

That's a neat quote. I read it in Harper's back in 1996 and it has really stuck with me.

I feel like it describes some of my days pretty well. But another part of me thinks he's writing from a very privileged position, and doesn't (want to) recognize it.

Re: Amazon Dash Button

#480
I think it will surely be useful for many people and in the end that's what really matters here. But will I use it? unlikely. I'd much rather have something on my phone, a bunch of icons for things i order frequently, and single tap there.

How long until these light up and start talking to you, begging you to press the button whenever it senses motion near it?

But whatever - they're pushing the ball. If this takes off, eventually you'll be able to build your own - something I have been waiting for at a reasonable price point. It also means other market engagement - things like food or medical monitoring - some good possibilities there.

But I don't think this is an april fools joke. If it is, they're the fools. It's only march 30th.

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