To not see the point of Alexa?

[abacucat]

Unless you are disabled, switching lights on or off is no big deal. And everything else is simply what you can do on a laptop or tablet. I don't see why you would spend money buying another gadget that doesn't do anything new.

Thanks mirri. I suspected so. So everything Alexa operates will be null and void. So if I had an Alexa and said "light the candles and fire",
it couldn't do that. So what does it do really?

I don't have a smartphone but spend 95% of my work time online.

Nope, don't want an Alexa to muck around with my radio, washing machine (unless it can load/unload it) or anything else.

But if anyone else likes them and finds the useful, carry on.

Jeff Bezos is our overlord. We just haven't realised it yet.

I can still turn on my charged up laptop, radio with electric and battery option, battery alarm clock - if there is a power cut.

The thing about Alexa is it's more immediate than interacting with a device with a screen and the easier and the more immediate it is the more natural and normal it feels to us
also we are highly highly predisposed to anthropomorphizing it because it has a human voice and that will make us treat it like a member of the family eventually
so we will trust it implicitly

A show will work with a bt hub. Have one working currently.

Lists and the like would still be accessible in a power cut as everything saves to the app.

I love alexa! Kids use it for music most days and also random facts, weather, news and some games. I use it for music whilst working at home and getting used to the shopping list. We also have an echo spot which we use to video call my parents. Yes could do facetime or WhatsApp but that way i don't have to handle a phone or laptop which can get damages by the kids running all over me. I'm sure there is a lot more i could do with the thing but the music at least makes it worth the cost.

Miri My reply was to someone who said they could not think of anything Alexa does that would work in a power cut. Thta isn't true.

I have a wind up radio and mobile phone charger.

I love our Alexa. I use it mainly for music but I do use some other features also

wouldn't know what a VPN or Tor was even if both bit them one on each arse cheek
I'm fully aware of these, thank you. I would also point out that all the people I know who work in IT security (and there are quite a few) refuse to have one of these in their homes.

We have a Google home, it came free unexpectedly with something else, we mainly use it for music, but it is useful for other things. My dad is late sixties and a technophobe (we got him a smart phone once but that's another story, he's gone back to a Nokia 3210), he likes it he'll ask about traffic, weather, news etc. DM is getting him one for Christmas. I also have a friend who is almost completely blind and she says her Alexa is better than using the voice software on her phone.

As for being listened to by spies, they can have at it, the conversation in our house really isn't that interesting to a foreign government and I don't remember ever reading out bank details outloud, no need.

Can someone with an Alexa tell me how it actually selects the music? I mean, if I say "Alexa, play me Beautiful Girls from Follies" - which is a musical by Stephen Sondheim - where does it find it? Does it just hunt a version down off the net? What if you don't like the one it plays, can you ask it to find the one from the 1985 New York concert recording rather than that shitty 1987 London cast recording? Or does it go to your own music collection that you've uploaded to the Cloud, and therefore if you had five recordings of Follies, would it ask you to specify which?

The whole power cut scenario is hilarious

So you turn on your electric lights with a switch, someone people use Alexa....yup neither are going to work in a power cut.

It's a toy, it doesn't immediately negate years of doing stuff and render one completely incapable! I mean, I use it to add items to a shopping list. I'm still able to write...

I agree. My ‘wonderful’ xH proceeded to brag about the Alexa he just purchased as well as a new huge TV. I clapped back with “yet you can’t afford a bed for our children at your house?” (They sleep on a blow up bed still almost four years since we split...)

I’ve never understood the point of Alexa. I asked DP why people have them and he said it’s literally just a huge gimmick that will be obsolete in a few years.

Alexa, play me Beautiful Girls from Follies" - which is a musical by Stephen Sondheim - where does it find it

Either from Spotify or amazon, depending on which music service you have as your default

I asked DP why people have them and he said it’s literally just a huge gimmick that will be obsolete in a few years

It likely will be obsolete in a few years, but not because it's a gimmick, but because artificial intelligence will have developed much further than it is today. A bit like how old phones, TVs or computers have become obsolete. Not becayse they were a gimmick, but because tech moves fast.

That's the point though. If you have Alexa set up to control your heating, your lights, your oven and everything else, it's not going to be that easy, is it?

It’s not going to be any harder than just not having it in the first place. I’m not going to forget how to turn on the lights just because I can ask Siri to do it.

The more gradually it would happen the better since there’s a longer time to adjust. First hint of people being disappeared merely for their opinions I’ll chuck out my HomePod (and mobile phone and laptops with microphones etc etc).

I work with people who have various disabilities and Alexa and Google Home are hugely popular. I see people with mobility issues, people with sight problems and even people with speech problems using them for all sorts of things, from turning lights on and off to having a book read to them, playing music and making shopping lists. In that context, they are real aids to independence.

I agree that Alexa and her counterparts have great potential for good!
We should all be able to benefit from this new technology (because we all helped to build it) without being spied on and profiled and farmed for data

I'm not sure that service could exist. There has to be a company at the back of the speaker handling the data and making it work with the various services.

That's the point though. If you have Alexa set up to control your heating, your lights, your oven and everything else, it's not going to be that easy, is it?

I can still do it all manually - either through apps on my phone or the 'normal' way. Having smart heating and lighting saves us a lot of money so I'd be loathed to give it up from that perspective but nothing we have is difficult to reverse and we manually use it if the wifi goes down.

WinterfellWench we don't have hive but have another smart heating system. This year it has already saved us over £500 by having us not heat rooms we don't use, having certain rooms hotter or colder than others and being able to turn the heating off when we aren't in the house unexpectedly. And whilst it is nice to have the house warm when I arrive home, it's primary purpose for us is money saving!