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Alexa made me write about voice. We signed up early for this Amazon Echo home control/music library accessed through a Pringle can looking box. True, it needs to be connected to broadband and yes, it needs to be plugged into a wall outlet. But it has no keyboard, only voice input through a lighted-ring of seven microphones listening, continuously learning speech patterns. What to ask this smart-aleck Alexa? Well, it turns out, it can play an amazing ‘shuffle’ of music you may have purchased through Amazon, but if you are an Amazon Prime member ($99/year), it can also play any of a million songs. And it has the ability to set up logic scripts (If This, Then That) – links between wake-up alarms and turning on the lights. Oh, and did you know that to encourage voice-tech adoption, Amazon is also launching a $100 million Alexa Fund?
Most new tech is annoying out of the box – this not quite as much. This product was surprisingly easy to set up as compared to my overpriced and rather touchy smartphone and endlessly patched laptop. Though set up of its Wifi connection is tricky – some Yetanothergeeky effort is required for that. But moving past that hassle factor, it seems to this ear that the delight of its user interface is in the no-touch voice-plus-brains – Siri in the kitchen without the phone.
Voice interfaces make the difference for these other startups. Which brings me to the several other very new entrants -- pre-launch and barely launched -- that want users to take their fingers off the keyboard and buttons – text is taken from the websites of or about the companies – at this writing it appears that all are at the pre-order stage:
Comments
Talk to me!
My future son-in-law has one and I play with it when I'm over there! So far it is strictly a radio but who knows, maybe I'll get one, see if it has an easy calendar function so I can get rid of the white-board calendar that covers the refrigerator! On second thought, my wife wouldn't like it. "Another toy that I can't figure out without you telling me how to use it - NO - stay with the white-board!"
Calendar -- links to Google Calendar!
http://www.zdnet.com/article/amazon-echo-talks-to-google-calendar-and-you/
And now Google Home
November, 2016, the launch of Google Home -- voice-enabled smart home device that uses Google search