Amazon Echo

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The fire phone kinda died, and their tablet isn't shaking things up much but at least they keep trying new stuff.

Amazon Echo

Their stand alone music player, and general Siri clone.

Looks neat. Wonder how well it will work.

Echo

I just wish the Google Now app would do this. My phone is around me at all times so I wish I could just say "OK Google" and my phone starts to listen. Much more convenient than this.

With "Hey Siri" it needs to be plugged in so it defeats the purpose IMO.

Also that commercial is so damn corny I cringed watching it.

TempestBlayze wrote:

I just wish the Google Now app would do this. My phone is around me at all times so I wish I could just say "OK Google" and my phone starts to listen. Much more convenient than this.

With the right hardware, you can. This seems like a neat piece of tech to show off to your friends, but it's only going to be a year before the "always listening" feature becomes standard in high-end phones. At that point you only have an expensive bluetooth speaker.

It's $100 for Prime Members. I'd hardly call that expensive.

if it linked to Google Play for music that would make it significantly more interesting.

I think what most people are going to take away from this thing is, it can hear you from anywhere.

Can I change its name to Jarvis?

Michael wrote:

Can I change its name to Ultron?

FTFM

Amazon's Echo Might Be Its Most Important Product In Years

I can only assume they mean since the Kindle. The Kindle was kind of amazing.

garion333 wrote:

Echo

IMAGE(https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQpaMauF2ibKGTXgqZvjM6HJxdb3B1ocVYhUL3MOOfL98yFRJt6)

Atras wrote:
Michael wrote:

Can I change its name to Alfred?

FTFM

FTFMFM

Confirm now that you don't not want me to not restart reading 50 Shades of Grey where you left off.

I, wait, wha-

Confirmed. "I don't know what to say," she murmured.

Wait, it asks you to say Alexa? Why couldn't I just say "echo"? That sounds so much more fun and Sci-fi.

sup909 wrote:

Wait, it asks you to say Alexa? Why couldn't I just say "echo"? That sounds so much more fun and Sci-fi.

You get to pick the name.

Edit: At least in the video he says it only listens when you say the wake word you choose. But on the webpage it says : Echo is always ready, connected, and fast. Just say the wake word, "Alexa,"

So, maybe Alexa is the default or that corny dude in the video is lying to us all.

I hope they release celebrity voice packs for it. I'd probably go with Homer, or maybe Mr. Burns. Or Vader. Vader'd be great. Or the dude from the Princess Bride.

And it college dorms around the country there will be vast numbers of wildly inappropriate names.

"Semen, make a to do list."
"Boobies, play me some jazz!"
"Big Dong, what is the atomic weight of cesium?"

Chairman_Mao wrote:

I hope they release celebrity voice packs for it. I'd probably go with Homer, or maybe Mr. Burns. Or Vader. Vader'd be great. Or the dude from the Princess Bride.

I actually really like this thing. I've taken to doing a lot of voice commands with Cortana (yes, I have a Windows Phone) but kinda wish it was listening all the time as well as not being in my pocket.

Alexa is my goddaughter's name. Might be awkward if that's the hardcoded name in their household.

Controlled by your voice for hands-free convenience
Voice recognition hears you from across the room

You know, putting an always-on mic into your room, on a device you don't fully control (in fact, that you don't control at all), strikes me as an extremely bad idea.

I'm going to name it Joshua.

Malor wrote:
Controlled by your voice for hands-free convenience
Voice recognition hears you from across the room

You know, putting an always-on mic into your room, on a device you don't fully control (in fact, that you don't control at all), strikes me as an extremely bad idea.

IMAGE(http://blog.eternalvigilance.me/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/paranoid1.jpg)

Malor wrote:
Controlled by your voice for hands-free convenience
Voice recognition hears you from across the room

You know, putting an always-on mic into your room, on a device you don't fully control (in fact, that you don't control at all), strikes me as an extremely bad idea.

You mean like the one in your cellphone and the one on your laptop and the one on your Xbox? Seriously, all three seem like obvious hack targets. It's just a question of how much paranoia you can live with. That's not a dig -- I can totally see why some folks might not want. All that said, I am presuming there's a way to turn it off/unplug it when you want to plot the overthrow of the Condo Association.

Gorilla.800.lbs wrote:
garion333 wrote:

Echo

IMAGE(https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQpaMauF2ibKGTXgqZvjM6HJxdb3B1ocVYhUL3MOOfL98yFRJt6)

How come no-one is getting my reference here?

Gorilla.800.lbs wrote:
Gorilla.800.lbs wrote:
garion333 wrote:

Echo

IMAGE(https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQpaMauF2ibKGTXgqZvjM6HJxdb3B1ocVYhUL3MOOfL98yFRJt6)

How come no-one is getting my reference here?

Oh, I got it. I thought it was hilarious.

rabbit wrote:
Malor wrote:
Controlled by your voice for hands-free convenience
Voice recognition hears you from across the room

You know, putting an always-on mic into your room, on a device you don't fully control (in fact, that you don't control at all), strikes me as an extremely bad idea.

You mean like the one in your cellphone and the one on your laptop and the one on your Xbox? Seriously, all three seem like obvious hack targets. It's just a question of how much paranoia you can live with. That's not a dig -- I can totally see why some folks might not want. All that said, I am presuming there's a way to turn it off/unplug it when you want to plot the overthrow of the Condo Association.

To be fair, there’s a subtle difference here. The microphones in your phone and laptop are in a normally-off mode until you decide to engage them. The fact that they can be turned on at any time by a malicious outside force is a concern, but it’s something that occurs outside of their normal operation.

With the Amazon Talking Shakeweight, it’s ostensibly listening all the time. Further, they said that the computing power is done “in the cloud with Amazon’s services”. Its normal operating mode is always on, always listening, always transmitting what’s happening back to home base.

tl;dr Amazon is listening to you poop

Michael wrote:
rabbit wrote:
Malor wrote:
Controlled by your voice for hands-free convenience
Voice recognition hears you from across the room

You know, putting an always-on mic into your room, on a device you don't fully control (in fact, that you don't control at all), strikes me as an extremely bad idea.

You mean like the one in your cellphone and the one on your laptop and the one on your Xbox? Seriously, all three seem like obvious hack targets. It's just a question of how much paranoia you can live with. That's not a dig -- I can totally see why some folks might not want. All that said, I am presuming there's a way to turn it off/unplug it when you want to plot the overthrow of the Condo Association.

To be fair, there’s a subtle difference here. The microphones in your phone and laptop are in a normally-off mode until you decide to engage them. The fact that they can be turned on at any time by a malicious outside force is a concern, but it’s something that occurs outside of their normal operation.

With the Amazon Talking Shakeweight, it’s ostensibly listening all the time. Further, they said that the computing power is done “in the cloud with Amazon’s services”. Its normal operating mode is always on, always listening, always transmitting what’s happening back to home base.

tl;dr Amazon is listening to you poop

My understanding was that it doesn't transmit until you use the keyword to activate it.

Until you say "Alexa" or "Isis4Lyfe" or whatever your passphrase is, it will be listening but not transmitting. Once you wake it up, it starts transmitting to Amazon for the answers. I suspect that if people find out it's transmitting even while inactive, that will be bad for Amazon/the Echo.

LouZiffer wrote:

I'm going to name it Joshua.

I'm going to name mine NSA. Skip a step.

Snowden or Putin for me.

Obama?

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