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Alexa is in millions of households and Amazon is losing billions

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Re: Alexa is in millions of households and Amazon is losing billions

#591

Post by ssl-3 »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #379
janalsncm wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Alexa could do the dishes for me that would absolutely be a killer app.

Tie it to an as-yet-unknown startup company that sends people to your house very quickly to perform individual light housekeeping tasks. "MicroMaids.com" or some such. Sounds invasive and scary, but I would've said (and probably did say) similar things about a service that connected you with strangers for the purpose of getting into their cars.

That's an easy route to a 10- or 11-figure company with a huge liability policy and a very fat band of warm bodies in the middle that all conspires to mean both high prices, and minimal pay with terrible terms for those doing the work -- just like Uber.

Other than the fact that it broadly sounds awful, I don't see a downside. I'd sometimes love to have such a service myself: I have plenty of money to buy services and very little time when I'm busy, but when I'm not busy I have plenty of time to do these things myself, which I prefer. Hiring things to be done on a regular schedule doesn't really work for me.

But an informally-arranged, impromptu service? Maybe?

---

"Alexa, mow the lawn."

"OK. Greenscape will arrive today between 3 and 4PM to mow the lawn. By the way, did you know that Husqvarna offers automated electric lawnmowers? Would you like to know more?"

beep

---

Who's up for exploitation? Anyone?

Re: Alexa is in millions of households and Amazon is losing billions

#592

Post by schrodinger »

tomoyoirl wrote: post #523
eru wrote: post #513

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Here in Europe, it's been mandatory to show a price related to a reasonable common base point (e.g. liter, kilogram, piece, usage-unit for laundry detergent) adjacent to the actual product's price for many years now. You can go and use 1/10/100 grams/milliliters though for small scale packages where that is reasonably common (e.g. spices), and that's it. That's pretty irrelevant to the discussion at hand. It's abou…

Amazon is kind enough to include unit pricing on many UI elements. It does seem to be less than consistent about the units, though. $/count, $/oz, $/g, $/lb, all on the same search page? Yes, and more :)

The point was that they're _not_ kind enough when you buy through Alex. The instant coffee you bought last month could have doubled but if you say "Alexa add [the coffee] to my cart ot just work… and if my anexcodes extrapolate at all, LOTS people use this feature.

Re: Alexa is in millions of households and Amazon is losing billions

#593

Post by WalterBright »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #514
tgma wrote: post #491

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The amount of tax is equally useless to me. Not if you are voting someone in a political office in the next election.

Then you can look up how much the tax is when you are making your voting decision. This isn’t secret information.

The government routinely hides what you're paying in taxes. Case in point - the so-called "Employer's Contribution" to your social security taxes. There's no such thing. That comes out of your pocket, too.

This is because employers have no interest in what your paycheck amount is. They care about "total compensation", which is what it costs the employer to employ you. Seattle added some "payroll taxes" and successfully sold the fiction that it was the businesses paying it. The businesses did indeed write the check, but it was the employee's money.

Re: Alexa is in millions of households and Amazon is losing billions

#594

Post by throwaway2037 »

tgma wrote: post #470
WalterBright wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> mandatory 2 year minimum warranty period Such regulations make products more expensive. I'm constantly offered warranties when I buy online. I don't want to be forced to buy them, as I don't need them.

Not sure why you're downvoted. There is material difference in prices of electronics due to whatever reason (taxes, warranties, low scale, etc) to the degree that my European friends often purchase laptops and iPhones when they travel to US.

Do those products have worldwide warranties? Often not. That is a real issue with buying electronics outside your home country.

Re: Alexa is in millions of households and Amazon is losing billions

#595

Post by WalterBright »

tsimionescu wrote: post #573
WalterBright wrote: post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The tax exclusive prices lets you know how much the government is soaking you, rather than hiding it and blaming it on the business.

So you believe that prices are set by supply and demand and nothing else in all of your other discussions, but when it comes to taxes, it's the government's fault? When a tax hike happens, businesses don't automatically have to increase prices they charge by the same amount: they can take a hit to their margin instead. So, the price they choose to charge is not "price + tax". It is "supply-and-demand price, of which…

Taxes are not set by supply & demand.

> they can take a hit to their margin instead

Not for long. Low margin businesses tend to go out of business. And if you can earn 5% buying bonds, why run a business that has an ROI of 4%?

Re: Alexa is in millions of households and Amazon is losing billions

#596

Post by throwaway2037 »

sebastiennight wrote: post #424
cqqxo4zV46cp wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is fun. The person you’ve replied to has stated a concrete (what they perceive to be) benefit of consumer protection regulation. One that doesn’t seem to limit choice at all, but rather improves visibility. I’m also inserting my own personal experience here. The country I live in, which isn’t in Europe, has similar regulation in place. In response you’re throwing around some vague notion of “freedom” and vague i…

I tried to book a small-group (~12 people) conference room at a US hotel and when I asked for a flipchart, they added "resort fees" and a $200 staff "service fee" to bring the flipchart into the room. This was on top of renting me the flipchart for $107 for 6 hours.

    > renting me the flipchart for $107 for 6 hours
Next time, just ship it from Walmart or Amazon and throw it away when done with it.

Re: Alexa is in millions of households and Amazon is losing billions

#597

Post by WalterBright »

jcranmer wrote: post #455
WalterBright wrote: post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The tax exclusive prices lets you know how much the government is soaking you, rather than hiding it and blaming it on the business.

Everyone always blames price movements on the government anyways. And when it is tax inclusive--gasoline--the government hasn't dared to change the rate in decades!

Washington State added a 50c per gallon gas tax. They did it by taxing the oil companies, so when the pump prices went up 50c the politicians adamantly blamed the price increase on the oil companies.

Re: Alexa is in millions of households and Amazon is losing billions

#598

Post by WalterBright »

tgma wrote: post #470
WalterBright wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> mandatory 2 year minimum warranty period Such regulations make products more expensive. I'm constantly offered warranties when I buy online. I don't want to be forced to buy them, as I don't need them.

Not sure why you're downvoted. There is material difference in prices of electronics due to whatever reason (taxes, warranties, low scale, etc) to the degree that my European friends often purchase laptops and iPhones when they travel to US.

Anytime you get something "for free", you're paying for it one way or another. No amount of legislation can change that, they might as well legislate pi=3.

Re: Alexa is in millions of households and Amazon is losing billions

#599

Post by pedrogpimenta »

bogota wrote: post #587

I hope the product burns. For the simple fact that it was such a huge oversight to use a popular human name for a home assistant product. Really just such an extremely stupid thing to do.

Your name is Alexa, isn't it?

Re: Alexa is in millions of households and Amazon is losing billions

#600

Post by xp84 »

pmontra wrote: post #580
mlsu wrote: post #553

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a slog to do the “which one of these is least a ripoff” calculation, at the grocery store or online. I try to do the calculation nonetheless. But every time I just need to buy some ordinary staple, I’m up against the Relentless Spirit of Pure Deception, who attempts an ever evolving and always brand new form of trickery, at every engagement. Sometimes, I simply make the $1.00 donation to P&G or whoever just to a…

> It’s a slog to do the “which one of these is least a ripoff” calculation, at the grocery store Where I live price labels must carry the per liter or the per kilo price too. It's printed with a smaller font size but it's visible and it's often the only price I look at.

The unit price labels here in the US are hilariously messed up. The items you want to compare will be say, a pack of 6 granola bars or a 10 pack. The unit prices will be like:

#1: $0.37 / ounce

#2: $6.50 / pound

or even:

#3: $1.82 / each (a price per item)

This will even be common within the same exact brand too. The stores seem so bad at picking a consistent unit for a product category that it seems malicious, but it stretches my belief that they have the time to get it so wrong intentionally.

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