Amazon Echo - Expensive light switch?

[ColinD]

So the amazon echo... amazing, great, finally I can have a house that works like a starship.

 

My mind is buzzing with how I can make my house, but crucially others ( think older generation, infirm, elderly ) safer, or better somehow.

 

One day, all of a sudden this is here

 

 

So the amazon echo, snake oil, or early (possibly ) adopters of tech must have?

 

I was looking at them a few months ago, before the uk release ( soon ). I was miffed I could not easily get one... then now I can. I mentioned to SWMBO yesterday and after the initial cool... there wasa why have we not got one comment.

 

Which was funny, I'd mostly concluded it was an expensive way for me to turn my lights on and off  I've got boxes of various raspberry pi's and particle boards... just never coupled them up with an easy interface for #not-me to use.

 

What do you think about it?

 

This is a link ( referral ) to it, just in case you're thinking about buying one today, at a discount too.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Amazon-SK705DI-Echo-Black/dp/B01GAGVIE4/ref=as_li_ss_il?ie=UTF8&qid=1474026685&sr=8-1&keywords=amazon+echo&linkCode=li2&tag=b0f1c-21&linkId=d7cd000074e19437c43de141ef7adab7

 

 

[Aspman]

Saw it was tempted for it acting as quite a nice speaker and link to Amazon Prime Music.

 

But I'm not tempted enough to buy.

[Lady Elanore]

I use Wemo stuff (as per Colin's link), but my phone handles that. looks like it might be a useful hub for someone with a high tech house. I live in an old house that is in permanent chaos of tech, I think the Echo might just tip me over the edge.

[Aspman]

I'd be concerned that I'd yell at someone on TV to go "**** themselves with a chair leg" and a bottle of suspicious lubricant would arrive in the post the next day.

Edited 16 September, 2016 by Aspman

[Lady Elanore]

Although if you said "I'd love a 911 GTS" and one appeared 3 days later, you have an excuse for your wife when she threatens you with a bread knife

[GentleGiant]

I seem to remember there were some privacy issues raised about this when it was first unveiled, everything it "hears" is sent back to Amazon for "processing"; so effectively, you have just paid good money to have the NSA/GCHQ bug your house.

[ColinD]

I'd read those and the contra it 'waits for wake word'... if the nsa want to listen to my madness then please let them. I didn't order one. I figured a couple more particles would suffice for this seasons fun. Maybe next year.

 

If you believe half of what you read then my phone is doing the same right now. I don't care if they listen, what I say, what I type isn't private it's shared The only privacy I have is inside my head with all the other colins. Flippant I know.

[999pooch]

Most people with smart phones already have this feature -

Siri, Cortana, Google Now etc....

When the voice activation command is on, i.e., 'Hey Siri, and the equivalent for the other OS's, it does exactly the same as the Echo. So just a big box sat in the corner if the room waiting for someone visiting to say 'what's that?' And for the home owner to reply 'oh! Let me show you'. Followed by 30mins of turning lights on and off!!

[GentleGiant]

From what I remember, the original spec had everything being sent in plain text format, so anyone who could intercept the stream could read it.

[Lady Elanore]

The only privacy I have is inside my head with all the other colins.

 

 

I have to ask, are there many other Colins inside your head? Do they say things like " kill them all with your little knives"?  Do you find they get more unruly when you have eaten cheese? I think we need to know. 

[Aspman]

I have to ask, are there many other Colins inside your head? Do they say things like " kill them all with your little knives"?  Do you find they get more unruly when you have eaten cheese? I think we need to know. 

 

You mean there is only one of you in your head. How weird.

We sit down for a regular debate, kill 'em fast or kill 'em slow.

 

[octyal]

Why? What is the usefulness of this new-fangled bit of electronics that will no doubt be obsoleted by the newer model next year?

 

I still maintain that at this rate of electronic "advancement" we are all heading the wall-e way.....

 

[JohnMcL7]

I was certainly tempted by the Echo just to have something like Star Trek but the more I thought about it, the more I realised I prefer just using my phone for that sort of thing as I don't use Google Now or Cortana.  Plus there's the nagging doubt how well it would work with a Scottish accent:

 

[Aspman]

With Echo you are also very much tied to Amazon Prime.

 

If it doesn't sell the price will come down fast anyway. It was on offer for £99 the first couple of days to Prime customers, I'm sure that'll get repeated regularly.

 

Other than industrial functions I really don't get this whole IOT thing. But then I work in IT security so I have a more paranoid perspective.

[dbg400]

Tempted and succumbed!

 

It arrived this afternoon. I think there must have been some take-up at least, as some of the services are unavailable - can't link it to our Spotify account yet.

 

It's a fairly heavy & sturdy unit, and can go louder than expected. Sound quality is very good, though my lad says it's not as good as the Bose Soundlink mini (the same price as the Echo before discount). What has surprised me is how good the voice recognition is, though it did get confused by Natty Loon (by Elephant Talk) thinking we wanted Naughty Moon...

 

No intelligent devices here, so it will live in the kitchen as a glorified hands free radio (though given the price of decent DAB radios I don't think it's too bad a deal)! I just need to figure out how to get BBC podcasts on there. There are lots of apps, called skills, that can be enabled to extend what it can do, though quite what the quality will be remains to be seen. Probably much like Android with a huge number of pointless or limited apps with a few decent ones if you can find them.

 

There's a matching Alexa app that does the initial pairing with your wifi, and lets you enable/disable skills, etc. It can also work as a media player handy with unpronounceable track names!

 

It should also work as a bluetooth speaker, but I've not tried that yet. Fun & games ahead...

[Gyp]

Indeed. Voice activated light switch achieved.

[Phil-E]

I think it only really makes sense to those who already have some smart devices and are looking for the missing link to tie them all together.

 

I'm considering the dot smaller version.

 

I currently have:

 

Phlips Hue- 3x hue colour bulbs, 2x hue lux bulbs, 3x osram lightify RGBW, 2x Philips living whites, 1x living whites remote and 2x hue dimmer switches.

 

Nest Thermostat

 

Logitech Harmony Ultimate One remote and hub

 

Although they all talk to each other there is no one central place to control them ALL from. I use the remote quite a bit as it has my scenes for lights on there and allows to me program activities (turn on Blu-ray, TV dim lights, turn thermostat down etc etc).

 

I think for £50 the echo dot doesn't seem too bad.

Edited 12 October, 2016 by Phil-E

[ColinD]

Then of course there is the google home product...

 

https://madeby.google.com/home/

 

The winner will I suspect be the one with the marketing budget, sales presence and perhaps, just perhaps the one that's the most open to other stuff... and of course I mean open outbound, not inbound

 

Ironically my 'idea' board is strong for this type of device, but not for a few more years as the reliance on data and most 70+ don't have strong data connections ( yet ) but do have a higher than most need for voice controls... not quite good enough to gamble the house on.

[Aspman]

Then of course there is the google home product...

 

https://madeby.google.com/home/

 

The winner will I suspect be the one with the marketing budget, sales presence and perhaps, just perhaps the one that's the most open to other stuff... and of course I mean open outbound, not inbound

 

Ironically my 'idea' board is strong for this type of device, but not for a few more years as the reliance on data and most 70+ don't have strong data connections ( yet ) but do have a higher than most need for voice controls... not quite good enough to gamble the house on.

 

Remembering that Google is building up a bit of a track record of dropping products that don't sell and leaving people in the lurch

 

http://uk.businessinsider.com/googles-nest-closing-smart-home-company-revolv-bricking-devices-2016-4

[@Lee]

New kid on the block; LingLong Ding Dong no Ting Tong

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-38074089

[gadgetman]

From what I remember, the original spec had everything being sent in plain text format, so anyone who could intercept the stream could read it.

Find that hard to believe

[Aspman]

Have you seen the Chinese version.

 

I have to be honest and say I thought this was a spoof to start with but it's real.

 

The Linglong Dingdong

 

https://www.wired.com/2016/11/behold-chinas-answer-amazon-echo-linglong-dingdong/

[@Lee]

Have you seen the Chinese version.

 

I have to be honest and say I thought this was a spoof to start with but it's real.

 

The Linglong Dingdong

 

https://www.wired.com/2016/11/behold-chinas-answer-amazon-echo-linglong-dingdong/

Take it you didn't see my post (#20) Yours is Post #22 BTW :p

[Aspman]

Take it you didn't see my post (#20) Yours is Post #22 BTW :p

 

TLDR :p

 

I love my LingLong DingDong so much I said it twice

 

[Huwcymru]

It seems Santa (middle son) who is an enthusiastic techie is buying we an Amazon dot for Christmas. As we use a Hive thermostat (and will add intelligent plugs and bulbs - we travel a lot and I'll set up my shed with motion detectors linked to the Hive) and our music system is Sonos based it has a lot of potential to me. I'll report in January.