We dipped our toes into an Echo last year and decided to add a Echo Dot to our kitchen. It’s primarily used for music listening and playing Jeopardy. What do you all use it for?!
I understand there’s a lot you can do with the Echo, but I use it to verbally tell me the time 99% of the time :sad:
I also use it for news and weather every once in a while… and occasionally to impress friends with jokes like “make me a sandwich” … “sudo make me a sandwich”. Oh no. She changed. I just tried it and she called me a sandwich right off the bat. Guess that joke wasn’t mainstream enough :trout:
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I’m still a little scared of them being on all the time so I don’t own one now. Some day I could see myself using them for quick general questions instead of typing all these 10s of letters in when wanting to know stuff, cause laziness.
Did I see this here? Someone posted a video or article about using these types of talk tech for assistance in mechanical repairs. So assembling or repairing some crazy complicated piece of equipment, rather putting your hands down to grab the manual (digital or not) instead your talking your way through it with an “AI” similar to that sassy robot in interstellar. I think that seems like very practical use. It seems I’m out of terminator jokes right now
They promote alexa as being good in the kitchen for reasons like this, but, you know, for cooking (the video/article for mechanical repairs doesn’t ring a bell).
I do use her for music a lot, including a local morning show which doesn’t come in well over FM but does fine through iHeartRadio. Never for cooking. I already know how to use a microwave, psssh.
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I haven’t considered getting either.
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Waiting for the future Apple product in this space?!!! 
I have three Homes. I use them to control the lights, play music, make phone calls, check business hours, set alarms, check the weather, set reminders, set cooking timers, do math, … They’re probably the coolest toys I own. 
If I had to guess, it’d be that krilnon is waiting for a version with no internet connectivity.
What’s that supposed to mean? 
Even with no internet activity you can have a voice to text software transcribe massive amounts of audio and send the transcript as a tiny file when the user inevitably performance an update. Unless, I suppose, all your updates are downloaded and physically brought to the machine where it never goes online…I don’t see that ever happening again though. I’m not saying it was aliens… But
Does your hesitance stem from a security- or privacy-based fear? I feel like that’s the main deterrent for most of my friends. I’m curious about your thoughts.
They just seem like things I’d use less than my two Lytton cameras. I already have internet-connected microphones strapped to my wrist and pocket and in front of my face most of the day.
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I think the speaker is a big part of their appeal, but that makes sense.
To extend on what krilnon said, I don’t use any of the myriad digital assistants available to me as it is.
I like to use Siri on my phone or tablet. I don’t see any reason to buy another assistant in the house. I believe wearables are the future. I wish my tv would have an assistant without any extra box connected.
I do not use any of them, not even Siri on my phone. My plan is when the robots take over my voice will be the least recognizable, thus giving me a head start off the grid into the mountains. Sadly a drone will probably eventually find me.
It’s too late. Everyone else’s phones have already heard you!
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