
The Terrible Truth About Alexa - jbegley
https://gizmodo.com/the-terrible-truth-about-alexa-1834075404
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mikestew
"Why doesn't it work this way?"

"Why doesn't Amazon do this thing?"

"Why, why, why?"

Umm, why did you buy one in the first place, and after such revelations, why
do you continue to have one in your house? Instead of just listing reasons
that one should not buy such a device, the article came across to me as, "man,
I really love this Alexa thing, but it creeps me out. Why can't Amazon...?"
rather than just throw the thing in the trash if it bothers you that much.

~~~
mikece
I'm curious how many people __didn 't __buy these but got them for free as
part of some other package (like renewing service on Verizon). Personally, I
won an Echo Dot at a programming meetup but haven 't had it plugged for over
15 months.

~~~
mikestew
Hmm, a good point I didn't even know to consider. I'm over here in the Apple
camp thinking that such things cost $350 a pop.

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omnifischer
Actually, the terrible truth about gizmodo is the praise they gave to amazon
echo show. why do these publications have 'cognitive dissonance'? Please.
[https://gizmodo.com/the-amazon-echo-show-is-the-best-dumb-
sm...](https://gizmodo.com/the-amazon-echo-show-is-the-best-dumb-smart-
machine-in-1796380588)

~~~
iamdelirium
People are allowed to change their minds, why aren't publications? Also, you
should realize that the two articles have two different authors.

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mikece
While it's possible to request from Amazon everything that they (claim to)
have on their servers from our Alexa devices, it would be better if there was
some way to explicitly deafen the devices. I had been using my Echo dot
primary as an audio source to my living room speakers. But since it's not
possible to know when the room audio is being piped back to Amazon I unplugged
it. If there was a way to explicitly not wake to an audio prompt but only to a
touch command I would consider plugging it back in... but I really don't trust
it. So these days my living room speakers are fed by a very old iPod touch.

~~~
Slippery_John
I'm not entirely sure what you mean by "a touch command", but you can always
hit the mute button which physically disconnects the mic circuit.

