Carolyne Mas
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case in point regarding Apple: tel Siri to play "Suicide Note Pt. 1" by Pantera. The results are hilarious
Ilias karim
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Bob ask Alexa for more cowbell! Or to enter self destruct mode!
Mark Bridges
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Someone gave me an echo for the holidays. My wife set it up. We have it hooked up to amazon music and our hue connected lights. We changed it to respond to "echo" instead of "Alexa" seems less creepy. We were laying in bed this morning calling out tunes; metallica should hang it up..Their recent live stuff is worse than Lucas fucking with star wars.
Check out Philips hue if you haven't already. "Alexa, turn on the lights" is sooooooo effing cool. self driving cars and voice recognition, the future is coming on fast
James Kirst
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One problem with declaring that Amazon 'won:' the Echo line is only available in the US and UK. It clearly has an advantage there, but you can't have world domination through two countries. Even Google Home has wider reach. If Apple is indeed working on a smart speaker (as it's rumored to be) and ships it worldwide like it does with most products, it might take the lead simply by being the only game in town for most customers.
Jon Fingas
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I've been a Mac user since first using one working on my high-school newspaper in 1991. The local college computer labs, where my friends and I would go to use the free internet (long before we owned computers ourselves), were always filled with Macs. The first computer I ever owned was the original blueberry colored iMac.
It was only ten years ago when a Time Warner Cable guy at my new house to setup my Internet was upset by the mere presence of an Apple laptop. He immediately radioed in for help! "This guy has a Mac." He kept asking me if I had another computer in the house he could work on instead. He was at my home for nearly an hour waiting for their "Mac guy" to show-up. I kept politely telling him that I was already on my next door neighbor's wifi, so whatever his issue was in setting up the internet, it wasn't my "Mac." After the "Mac" guy from TWC arrived, he went to put a CD into my laptop to install some software. I stopped him and asked them both to leave.
At some point Apple crossed over from the "cool kids club" to what you often refer to as the "hoi polloi," hitting its "tipping point." And that was fine with me. I've never been the person who abandoned a band because they signed to a major label and the less confused Internet installation people around, the better! But what's going on here now? I bought the first and second generation AppleTV. I have yet to upgrade. The iPhone 7 is the first iPhone I haven't owned, as I haven't seen any reason to upgrade from my 6, after always "needing" to upgrade before (of course, now that my 6 is having the battery issues that Apple will only admit the 6s has, I may have to…).
Has Apple jumped the shark (just like the phrase," jump the shark")? Because here we are in 2017, when everybody has an iPhone and/or uses some type of Apple device, and you've nailed something here that I've been feeling since I purchased my Amazon Echo. Why doesn't Apple have a device and service that's even comparable, let alone better? Did they really spend all of that money for overrated headphones so they could make a complicated service I'm even less interested in than when they tried to make a social network (remember that? I already forget what it was called). I'm still using all Mac devices in my home and office… Except for my Amazon Echo. And of course I have Spotify set as the default music service, because Spotify has the best interface, look, and usability and it WORKS WITH ALEXA.
It's not perfect. I've asked it to play "Hardwired… to Self-Destruct by Metallica" in a variety of ways without it working (eventually, it played the song, instead of the album. But the fix is easy — pull it up on my phone and then send it to my Echo). My complaints are few. As you said, "Alexa" almost always understands you, straight away.
Where will this lead people like me? Am I going to become someone with those goofy smartphones and laptops I've made fun of for so long? The ones that cause text messages to turn green? The stuff that catches fire in your hands? The devices with… Um, better cameras and faster stuff? Er, hmm… Seriously, I liked the simplicity and convenience in trusting Apple to have the best stuff, always. They're slipping. Will be interesting to see how folks like me feel about them a year from now.
- Ryan J. Downey
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Also today Ford announced that Alexa will be in their cars and BMW is on deck as well.
I think its fucked up and we've given away our souls, but as you've always said there will be one…. and Apple is losing out fast on being in any one of the places anymore.
David Tobin
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I completely agree Bob! That's why I built a way to create apps for it before Amazon released theirs: http://alexaho.me?utm_source=phplist5695&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=Re-Apple+Doesn%27t+Hear+The+Echo There's tons of interest in this from everyone - people in software, music (labels, venues, etc), and hospitality. And eventually it'll be more conversational and smarter and smarter as time goes on.
Zach Feldman
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So Right Bob!
Just bought Amazon Dot for $49. Blue tooth to my audio system… Fantastic!
Using Spotify and Amazon for music… Apple who?
EVERYTHING Music, news, weather, sounds fantastic.
Oh, and there is still a speaker if you don't have the sound system on.
Mike Renault
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Totally agree Bob. We just redid our entire house, new the, Sonos, everything. All I could think about was how is this not all Apple stuff? They should be owning all of that. Then my 10 year old boy bought himself and Echo Dot with his own money (bless up!) for only $50. I can't believe how cool and easy and accurate that thing is. And again, all I could think about was why didn't Apple do this years ago?
Bob Ferdman
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Can't wait til Echo integrates with Sonos! We have Echo and we have Sonos. I'm not enjoying the Echo speaker so I still mess around with Sonos and Spotify. Have you figured out a workaround already?
Jenny McCourt
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Hey Bob
Got a Echo Dot for Festivous (for the rest of us) and it is way cool. I read that SONOS will be integrating with it so you can play your Echo songs on your SONOS speakers. Since i have Amazon prime the Dot taps into Amazon Music and Bob's your Uncle.
alan fenton
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First off, Happy New Year to you.
As I've said to you before, my itunes library is FILLED with songs not found on any of the mainstream sites. I have a 4TB external drive with over 144,000 songs on it. Much of which are obscure albums and singles that have not seen legitimate release in the digital age.
And YouTube, which you often denigrade, has COUNTLESS rare 45s uploaded by collectors that Spotify and Shitify and Fuckify will never have.
That's why there are people like myself who still like Youtube and their own digital libraries. Now, someone should come up with voice command for personal computer libraries. THAT would be something.
Keep on keepin' on.
Kevin Kiley
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Right on Bob. I gave five as Christmas presents!!
Staying warm I hope!!
Its minus here in Columbus and snowing
Rick Vogt
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I got mine for Christmas! It is awesome. My wife makes fun of me. Says I like telling a woman what to do. Weather, traffic on route to work, NPR News on demand and I have not scratched the surface. The main thing though is I like to cook. Cooking takes some time and and I am not a great chef but believe in slow work. Chopping, grating, measuring, and to be able to be able to say "play the Good Rats, Gotta Get Back" and have it pop up... awesome. But I am a simple man.
Peace! You pushed me into this. Thanks.
Michael A. Becker
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Agree 100%. The last thing I testified this much about was my TiVo back in 2002.
Jim Horan
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You're right, Bob. I own 5 Echo units - one at each house, 2 Dots (bedroom, patio) and one Tap, just to carry around the property. Don't use that one very much, but I have it if I want to.
Alexa rules!
Apple can suck it - iTunes has been getting worse with each update for years now.
Bob Davis
Retired Roadie
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Bob, I love Alexa! The skills just keep growing, but yes, I did get it for the music. I have it wired to my main stereo system and it's keyed off my computer (not my Android phone or tablet). I have my entire music collection, that I've been collecting since the mid-70's, either on my computer or an external hard drive, and so anything I don't have on Amazon's cloud, I can easily Bluetooth from the computer. Not as easy as speaking it, but the music I listen to most frequently (Eagles) is on their cloud, so it's not usually a problem. It also means that when looking at videos on You Tube or Facebook or wherever, it streams via Bluetooth to the stereo.
I bought it for a lot of reasons, but I have to say, as someone that likes to cook, speaking to set a timer and turning it off is great, especially when I'm in the midst of washing dishes or otherwise have my hands a mess. I can do that on my phone ("OK Google"), but I don't always hear it when it goes off.
Google has a product now, Google Home. Eventually it will likely be more robust than Echo, but right now it listens the same as my phone and so when speaking, they'll both try to answer (my phone very seldom is inaccurate, probably because Google's voice features predate Siri by a couple of years, it wasn't as robust, but the ability to adapt to your voice and accent has been around longer). What I like about all this is, there's no reason not to have both. If Google does something better, use Google Home for that, if Alexa does something better, then use Echo.
Downsides to Echo? The commercials! One day, Uber is going to arrive at my house because a commercial activated it. The Dot lights up and tries to process it every time one of those commercials comes on.
Verna K. Rose
P.S. I forgot to mention, perhaps you've seen it, but later this year, Ford will start putting Alexa in its vehicles.
http://www.autoblog.com/2017/01/05/ford-sync-amazon-alexa-ibm-watson/?utm_source=phplist5695&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=Re-Apple+Doesn%27t+Hear+The+Echo
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Love your blogs a lot.
Happy 2017 and thinking you should hit Mammoth for fresh massive amount of heavy Sierra powder.
I have never sent you a " dispute " email but have to share that Google Home with Youtube Red is mind blowing amazing.
The above set up works just like you describe above and is magical when I request Praise You by King Arthur...
or Paul Oakenfold remixing Beautiful Day by U2 - My two favorite songs that power by creative vibe up.
I love Goggle Home & Youtube Red more than anything but the DJI Mavic Drone is almost as impressive in its own way ( lol )
For sure Google Home is fantastic and makes listening to music so much fun again.
Sending you all my best and giant thanks again for your words of wisdom.
My favorite Bob Blogs are your observations of popular culture.
Cheers To Us,
Mark in Malibu Canyon
Mark Jacob
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Got 1 almost a year ago.
I totally concur.
I do not have to get off my ass to
Say Alexa what time is it
Forecast for ny or Any other city town or village anywhere
Alexa what time is it in London
Alexa wake me at 630
Am
Alexa play sweet Virginia play
Norwegian wood
Coltrane miles.
And much more.
It's crazy.
Neil Lasher
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Here's the question Bob.
What is Amazon doing with all of the data it 'hears' through all of these Echo devices that are being deployed all over the world?
Do you know? I don't and that's what makes me hesitant.
Apple puts customer data security, customer privacy first. They've staked their reputation to it, even rebuffing the federal gov't when challenged.
'Hey Siri' even with it's imperfections at least has Apple's position on security+privacy behind it.
Maybe not all of us consider that when installing a semi-sentient network device in their home.
But I do and that's a major obstacle to me feeling comfortable with installing Echo in my home.
Just my two cents.
Paul Teeter
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Beyond music, turning off lights, and many other wonderful attributes, Alexa is also life affirming. Ask her, "Alexa, do you like me?" You'll enjoy her answer. I ask her for a joke every morning. Some are pretty funny, robotic inflections and all.
best,
Michael Laskow
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Amazon buys Sonos, and game over as far as I'm concerned.
Thanks Bob,
Brian Clothier
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You are so right about this. I had this same thought the other day. (Well, actually I thought to myself, "How does the Echo come up with these tracks?") Alexa played me some deep tracks (some of which I had never heard before) for an artist I (until then) thought I knew a lot about. Without any kind of special request.
Ned Menoyo
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I don't know about you but I surely don't want some Amazon geek listening to everything I say in range of Alexa. Data/voice mining for FUN + profit!
Steve Boone
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The acquiring of an Echo, a Dot and also a Google Home in Hawaii and schlepping them all the way home to Australia has been life changing, as much as starting on email in 1983, Apple in '85 and having my first website a decade later. I'm amazed that Apple didn't think to lead in the AI revolution as Amazon has.
For music, Alexa saves me an hour a day by allowing me to shift with a phrase from one artist/album/playlist to another through it running on all five stereo systems throughout the house (with Dots). All the while I can give it tasks, add to lists and reminders and even text by voice through them. Having it as the basis of my SmartHome here in the country, I can control lighting, security, appliances and more at a whim.
The best part though Bob that you may appreciate joining me in the advanced age race is a skill called Ask My Buddy that sets up as many as ten friend contacts who can be individually phoned, texted and/or emailed if you as Alexa to notify them that you need help. Like a fall, coronary, breathlessness or other injury. Instantly.
It will also find your lost phone in the house making it ring offline! Handy.
But it's the music application that sucked me in and I'm just in the process of adding my entire iTunes collection of 100,000 songs into Amazon Music Unlimited so that I can access what it and Spotify may not have, mainly my live non-record concerts.
Revolutionary!
Phil Tripp
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Re Echo/Amazon
This is my first note to you.
I too love my Echo and Amazon Music Prime.
But I also love iTunes on my PC.
But I also love Devialet Phantom speaker(sometimes sold in Apple Store). Check reviews on line and be prepared to buy.
I have uploaded iTunes library to Amazon cloud...called My Music (120000 tracks), where I have created playlists.
Where Echo is exceptionally vulnerable is: poor sound quality in large spaces. Outclassed by Devialet, Sonos5 or Bose.
Also Amazon My Music craps out on FireTV, but surprisingly it works well on iOS Alexa.
A magic wand would be: Amazon iTunes equivalent, an Echo family that merged Sonos network with Bose/ Devialet sound.
As a side note and some truth here.. over 50,000 tracks come from local libraries free.
I still buy about 200 to 500 cds per year... about half new half used all from Amazon.
I use Pandora free. Paid for awhile but went back to free.
Have tried Spotify meh.
Also Devialet has a radio feature in their iOS app that connects to a zillion internet international stations.
So...reality.
In the bathroom I have Sonos5 set to pandora...changed "station" weekly.
In kitchen Echo where I say play music...sometimes specific or use Alexa App to play my music playlists.
In Living Room I play Devialet Peru/Mali or Brazil internet radio.
In my office I have connected to PC German Adam Artist5 stereo monitor speakers, which have sound as good as Devialet.
Also in both LRoom and office I have Apple TV and Fire TV all connected to high end Amps/ Speaker set up.. but seldom use for music , except when PC with total music library is connected to net and iTunes in HomeShare mode connected to Apple TV.
Apple cloud is USELESS!!
It rejects most of my iTunes library because of their rules Amazon cloud has no rules...takes it all.
Conclusion...Apples overall Music(actually media) product line/ strategy/ has huge holes and is terribly vulnerable.
Their silent war with Amazon is stupid and counterproductive.
Love your posts.
Bob Brannon, retired hi tech guy from intel and HP
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Apple's been too busy trying to limit developers salaries... wait, doesn't Google and Amazon also collude on developers salaries. Or maybe Tim Cook was focusing too much on trying to get Hillary elected and took his eye of the pie.
- Carl Foggin
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My Brother -in-law works for Sony... Been there a while- since well before the 'hack' happened.
He's very integrated (an IT guy) in the ways of tech (email., social media, et all) and tells me of the sweeping 'suck' ALEXA is becoming, gobbling up waaaaay more personal information about anyone and everyone using this and other similar robotic devices.
Operator beware, Bob.
Kevin Patrick Goulet
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here is where the future is: Sonos + Echo Dot
https://youtu.be/NFJ7O7N5Yok?utm_source=phplist5695&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=Re-Apple+Doesn%27t+Hear+The+Echo
Eric Seifert
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Hey Bob. I love Apple... the Apple run by Steve Jobs. And that is gone. What is left is the scraps of the catcher-ons and the demise of Apple Innovation has been replaced by Apple copy-chatting by Apple themselves.
It's sad. It makes me angry. Steve died and took the magic with him.
Ugh.
Phil
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I have both a google home and echo and ask them both the same questions - it's no contest, Google home is a lot smarter. You can ask follow up questions and it feels more like a conversation. Spotify wise, it's a push
Mike Abbattista
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Couldn't agree more. This is a stretch but using siri is like grabbing the yellow pages (if yellow pages are even still in print). Amazon nailed it with the Echo.
Gary Marella
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Echo and the like are wonderful...if you don't mind installing an always-on surveillance device, which feeds directly into relatively unaccountable corporate servers, in your house. In Amazon's case, they also have a half- $billion cloud computing contract with the U.S. intelligence services.
What could possibly go wrong?
Jonathan
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I was all in on Apple until I tried the Alexa for fun. With the Alexa sitting on my desk I got an email from Spotify offering a cheap free trial of Spotify premium so have given that a go. The killer app is spotify connect allowing me to play spotify through its own app on Sonos, Alexa and Apple TV. Wow. In an instant I have upgraded to family premium. I had a few problems with my wife's account but Spotify customer service was brilliant and now I am all set. Apple Music? Fuggetaboutit!
Andrew Harting
P.s. Amazon should buy Spotify now!
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Couldn't agree more Bob. Just wait until the Sonos / Echo update penned for early this year becomes available, you'll be able to voice activate your Sonos system. For those of us with the Dot, accessing "Hard Days Night" via voice control is awesome but doesn't sound great. Add your Sonos system into the equation... game changer indeed!
One other thing to consider, is this just a stepping stone created by Amazon to get us ready for the next stage of AI? Would society be happy with jumping to the iRobot stage of personal assistant or is this the clever folk at Amazon (and Google etc) getting us familiar with this type of interface so we're ready for Alexa 2.0?
Mark Jennings
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Real question is does the Echo hear you, and everything that goes on in your home ? The rush to new tech and we stop asking the important questions. Do we need this and do we trust this ? This is beyond data mining. This is the American security apparatus under Trump control sitting down to dinner with you every night, then tucking you into bed. You can't get away from the security state, even in the land of the free, but do you have to invite it in and feed it ? Best of the new year to you.
Peter
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Bob,
You must have a premium Spotify account to link to Alexa
Thomas B
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Minor problem here. I do remember old song titles like paint it black, yellow submarine, imagine etc. etc.However this is definitely not the music I want to hear. So mostly I scroll a list out of my jazz, pop or classical categories and take a gamble on picking a few non familiar titles. And of course everything in lossless or high res. Thus I never have to listen to boring old titles :-) In Europe there is so much good new music people never heard of...But like you I am a baby boomer and unlike you I maybe hanging on to old habits.
And with a family I would prefer everyone to type their queries in stead of all family members shouting at an Echo...
However, my son gave me a Chrome cast for Xmas (I had my doubts about it), but I must admit it's quite convenient to stream Netflix series from my tablet. And especially I am surprised by the good and stable picture quality on my big plasma screen. My wife and I started binge watching house of cards from season 1. And we love it. So indeed you were right. Services like Netflix do indeed kill piracy!
Cheers and keep up the good work.
Nico Aarts
________________________________________
Great recap on voice control of music Bob.
Interestingly, Sonos has just seen the light on this as well.
Until last month Sonos was all in on controlling the music access experience, not just the devices and the wiring.
First you needed their $400 controller, which they dropped in favor of their mobile/desktop app, which is not great.
As of this year, you could jerryrig it to play from your Spotify app thru Google Chromecast to your Sonos.
But Sonos has finally given up control and support Spotify connect so you can play right from your Spotify app thru your Sonos (then seamlessly continue listening to your Spotify in your car).
And Sonos has announced plans to support Alexa and other voice interfaces, so they have clearly gotten the memo.
Whether they will survive as a high end wifi streaming and speaker system over the likes of Google Home as it evolves remains to be seen.
Keep up the good reporting
Eric Chaikin
Woodland Hills, CA
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I totally agree that Amazon did a complete end run around Apple/Siri with Echo/Alexa. It is certainly the device de jour.
With all the glee over it's seamless usability this is the thorny issue of customer privacy. To that point there is an interesting article about a murder case in Arkansas where the police want the server data from an Echo that was in the house when the crime was committed.
Here is a link to the article on engadget that gives more detail on whats going on.
https://www.engadget.com/2016/12/27/amazon-echo-audio-data-murder-case/?utm_source=phplist5695&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=Re-Apple+Doesn%27t+Hear+The+Echo
David Einstein
________________________________________
Thanks for the tip on making Spotify the default music service for Echo. I didn't know about that future and I honestly hated having to say, "on spotify" each time. It's a small change that makes things a lot easier!
Richard Young
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WOW...look how cool Alexa is becoming. HAHAHA... Guess you can't wait to request a song from your Alexa toilet. My question is, whose going to be listening in the background, huh? Do you really want Bezo's in your house? NOT.
We should be hoping that CCTV becomes ubiquitous, where you can at least see the cameras and feel safer.
Olie Kornelsen
http://www.brandchannel.com/2017/01/05/ces-2017-amazon-alexa-010516/?&&&utm_source=phplist5695&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=Re-Apple+Doesn%27t+Hear+The+Echo
P.S. Apple loses battles and wins wars Bob.
________________________________________
I haven't used Echo yet, but Google Home is anything but "blah." ;-)
I wish they'd roll out third-party integrations a little more quickly, but I'm so happy with it right now that I own two and bought one for a friend.
Matt Raymond
________________________________________
I totally agree. I first got the Firestick and I realized this is
cheaper and BETTER than my AppleTV. I used the Alexa feature on the
remote and it picked up everything I said with lightning speed. I even
tried mumbling or talking fast and it recognizes everything. Now,
after receiving an Echo as a Christmas gift, I use it all the time and
just fascinated with how well it works. You can even say some of the
lyrics of a song you're thinking of and it will find what you're
looking for. Alexa has made me forget about Siri altogether. 80% of
the time, Siri doesn't respond when I say "hey siri!" and on top of
it, she can never figure out what you're trying to say so I don't use
it at all.
If Amazon makes a decent phone and computer, I wouldn't mind switching
all my products to Amazon.
Mat Herbers
________________________________________
Hey Bob
Buy an LED globe to really see the difference and problem apple faces.
"Hey Alexa dining room light on." Done
Hey Siri - same thing - you have to be wearing a watch or have your phone. What about my 5 year old? He talks to Alexa for everything. "Hey Alexa what's the temperature? He Alexa spell fire station. Hey Alexa turn on bedroom light."
LED globes are going to make all others redundant. This is just the start. Apple home doesn't work for a family. They need to urgently fix this. Buy Sonos and put Siri into it.
Xross
Ross Mollison
Spiegelworld
________________________________________
I was just saying the same to a friend yesterday.
I switched from Spotify to Apple Music, and now because of echo (Which I had delivered on amazon now), I'm switching back.
Music is the killer app.
The friction is gone. And it won't just be music. It will be audio books, podcasts, and obviously buying stuff.
One annoyance is that I wish Amazon had more of a POV on the third party apps (skills). They should have rejected most of the apps because of the phrasing you need to use is too obtuse.
How can the apps succeed if it's too hard to remember what to teach people in your house and to use it again yourself? It's going to hurt the 3rd party developer market if apps have too much learning language frictions.
The human language is the API.
After buying the big one, I bought three dots and set them up for my three kids last night and put them in their bedrooms. It was painful. I had to create a Spotify account and an Amazon account for each. Luckily they already had Gmail accounts I created when they were born.
I tried using one Spotify account but you can't play two songs as once, let alone four. Then you need to add them all to the family plan, also a painful experience.
Anyway it's done now.
So now my three kids have a hi-fi system with an unlimited music library. Although I wish the speaker was better, for $50, it's hard to complain. They certainly aren't.
Gordon Mattey
________________________________________
Got the Echo a few months ago based on your raves and I have to say you are 95% right.
EXCEPT when it starts to say "Now connected to Zachary's Macbook Air" in the middle of the night at top volume for no apparent reason and scares the shit out of my kid.
I also find that it won't play itunes songs 50% of the time even if it's connected. Dunno if that's an Apple or Amazon issue, but very unstable.
Besides those few issues, it is awesome.
Happy new year!
--
Best Regards,
Zach Goode
________________________________________
er...
Apple's classic mpdel is to let others open the market, blow it and then come in and fix it dramatically. in this instance that might not work because of the velocity pc the marlet these days
google's product synchs which the amazpn product doesnt. same music in all rooms. that os a big deal
sirii stinks. the questip. is whether that is on accounta the spftware and AI, or the crap mic in the iphone. the Mazon and google products (amd related knockoffa) have seven or eight microphones of a completely different sort than the single mic in a phone hard comparison
four million is a lot it would be an irrelevsnt number if apple actuLly gets it right. which fhey clearly havent with Musoc but it seems npt to matter
short form: at present you are slam
dunk right. long term? jury is out. i cam
imagine Apple gettong it right and sellong 30 million a year. and i can fr the first time imaging Apple totally failing. pretty dang interesting
oohlikewowman
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Thank you for mentioning Rhapsody. I switched to Spotify nearly 3 years ago because my daughter's student account was half the price. I miss Rhapsody. I liked the layout. I liked the album reviews by Christgau and others.
Tom Quinn
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With ya. Have had a music crush on mine since the day I got it. The rest is just more levels of awesome. Great, great stuff. Apple's loss.
Paige J. Mann
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Alexa, did you witness a murder?
Bloomberg Law
https://bol.bna.com/could-amazon-echo-hold-evidence-in-a-murder-case/?utm_source=phplist5695&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=Re-Apple+Doesn%27t+Hear+The+Echo
Cheers,
G.Robey
________________________________________
Bob,
Don't count out Google on this one. I just got Google Home and had a similar experience to this:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jaymcgregor/2016/12/30/amazons-alexa-vs-google-assistant-24-questions-1-winner/?utm_source=phplist5695&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=Re-Apple+Doesn%27t+Hear+The+Echo#64f054b52649
Their AI capabilities are far superior to any other company out there right now. Just look at what they did with AlphaGo. That wasn't supposed to happen for years. First mover or a pretty facade is no match for a superior UX... uh hum... remember myspace? Google will market the shit out of this thing and people will start to notice.
The AI revolution is being exposed to the mainstream via voice activation, but it is much bigger than that and going to hit us like a semi --->
Self driving cars/trucks:
https://medium.com/basic-income/self-driving-trucks-are-going-to-hit-us-like-a-human-driven-truck-b8507d9c5961?utm_source=phplist5695&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=Re-Apple+Doesn%27t+Hear+The+Echo#.lzmcdvj52
AI concerns:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycJeht-Mfus&utm_source=phplist5695&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=Re-Apple+Doesn%27t+Hear+The+Echo
Deep Learning Revolution:
http://fortune.com/ai-artificial-intelligence-deep-machine-learning/?utm_source=phplist5695&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=Re-Apple+Doesn%27t+Hear+The+Echo
Great newsletter BTW. A co-worker recommended it and to be honest I hate newsletters and any email subscriptions. I read the first newsletter in my subscription and thought to myself - who is this old guy complaining about stuff??? But I read a few more and was genuinely intrigued by your opinion. Your newsletter and Quora are the only email subscriptions that have really kept my attention in the last 2 years. kudos and keep kicking out your opinion.... it actually provokes thoughts, unlike most stuff I'm exposed to.
John McAliley
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I can barely even read this without cracking up, and wanting to yell a little. I've got an Echo and an Echo Dot and a lot of connected accessories that are supposed to work with Alexa. I've bought in and tried to be open minded and on top of that, I know way more about tech than the average consumer, and getting Alexa to do much of anything but the very, very narrow stuff it can do well is an absolute nightmare. It's infuriating on a daily basis and it's gotten to the point where I don't even try anymore. It's worse than Siri was in the early days at all but the few things that I admit it does do well.
The speech recognition is great, even at a distance, I'll certainly give them that. If only it knew what to do with the commands then on a consistent basis. It has the music part mostly down (both Apple Music and Alexa struggle to play perhaps the right version of a track I've found), but why would I want to listen out of the Echo when I have audio systems that smoke it? I can connect a Dot to any system, but I have to switch inputs then away from Apple TV, which basically handles 99.9% of my home media consumption with ease. I can AirPlay audio to it from any of my Apple devices, and yes, as you said, Apple Music absolutely does play music with Siri as well, and has for quite some time. It doesn't work in a room, but "Hey Siri" on iPhone/iPad is lightning fast now, and it works well enough with Apple Watch if you have one, and Siri actually works well on Series 2 which is about as good as a listening-device in a room with Hey Siri (Siri was utterly useless on the first Apple Watch). And with Apple Watch, your listening device is with you wherever you go, and it's only going to get better. It's going to be your keys, your wallet, your remote, your always on you, always available listening device, and so-on. And Siri will work the same on all of these different devices as well; no small thing.
But getting back to Apple TV, what else can I do with it that I can't do with Alexa? AirPlay video, like Amazon Prime video, any audio, not just what Alexa works with, plus all the apps and everything else it does as a streamer/smart TV device. And Apple has sold a ton of Apple TVs, and it's certainly more of a mainstream media box than Echo is a mainstream home listening device. Wait until Apple combines the two and eliminates the need for the silly remote. Apple will undoubtedly put out a new Apple TV that's a lot closer in functionality to Echo; you know it's coming, and likely quite soon. And I'll tell you, it'll be a hit, because Siri truly is lightyears better than it used to be, HomeKit is an infinitely more robust and increasingly supported smart-home platform, and that's going to be huge moving forward, and Apple TV is already far more mainstream than Echo.
When it comes to connected devices, again, Echo/Alexa is atrociously bad and utterly and completely painful to use. Look at all the reviews in the Alexa app for the skills. They're horrible because none of them work well in the slightest. The smart part of the home platform is very, very broken. Siri and HomeKit are so far ahead of their competition on this front, and the setup is infinitely less painless than Alexa's, and the HomeKit platform is no doubt far more secure, which people should be worried about given events we've seen recently related to the hacking of the internet of things.
And believe me, I could rant and rave endlessly about Apple right now. They're a frustrating company at this point in time in so many ways, but they're still doing a lot of great stuff; the frequent doom and gloom sentiments are comical. Having used both platforms a great deal for some time now for a lot of different tasks, I firmly believe Apple is still way ahead of Amazon on the core smart technology front. Echo/Alexa has absolutely made me a believer in the home voice-enabled device, without a semblance of a doubt, but literally every single day I use it only makes me long for the Apple version more, because Siri absolutely is so much better than it used to be, and it's infinitely smarter with HomeKit devices, which most smart devices are.
"Hey Siri, turn on the lights in the living room, and what the hell, make them green."
And without touching anything, almost before I finish the sentence, I'm flooded with green light. And thankfully, it's just as quick and easy to set the lights back to something sensible!
I've fully embraced both platforms, and I've lost a lot of my Apple bias in the wake of the seemingly countless software problems lately, but there's simply no comparison to me between Siri and Alexa when we're talking potential in the voice-enabled home device space. I am glad you're excited about listening to music by talking to a box, it is cool, but it's barely the tip of the iceberg of where this is going. And it's not nearly enough to compensate for how utterly infuriating (more so than the early days of Siri in some ways, which is saying a lot) Alexa is at nearly everything else. And again, so many limitations!
This is a bit of a convoluted message, but hopefully you get my point. This is all cool, in many ways Echo is really cool. Again, I have two. But it's also really terrible in a lot of ways, and Apple isn't behind on the core technologies and platform as some people like to assume as opposed to actually looking into it again. My Echos will be replaced immediately once Apple puts out a listening version of Apple TV. I'll likely keep an Echo in the kitchen for Amazony-things, but that's about it unless it gets infinitely better fast.
Elliot Kleinfelder
P.S. I also trust Apple far more on the privacy front, which is kinda important when you're talking about keeping devices in your home that could always be listening.
P.P.S. When has Apple ever cared about being first to market???
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TV news report prompts viewers' Amazon Echo devices to order unwanted dollhouses:
http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2017/01/06/tv-news-report-prompts-viewers-amazon-echo-devices-to-order-unwanted-dollhouses.html?utm_source=phplist5695&utm_medium=email&utm_content=text&utm_campaign=Re-Apple+Doesn%27t+Hear+The+Echo
Josh Tarnow
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bob i can't believe you don't have a "Lefsetz Letter" skill yet
Ryan Burton
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