
Alexa isn’t the future of AI–it’s a glorified radio clock, and stupid otherwise - smalera
https://qz.com/900195/amazons-alexa-isnt-the-future-of-ai-its-a-glorified-radio-clock-and-stupid-otherwise/
======
iamleppert
I don't get the fascination with this tech. The computer in Star Trek at least
had a personality and intonation in its voice when it responded, even though
it sounded like a synthesized voice.

The key here is intonation -- the infinitely varying way in which we vary the
speed and pitch of our voices in response to another human being. It's very
subtle and something Amaazon, Google and Siri have been unable to capture. And
it makes interacting with these interfaces awkward and annoying to me. Either
it needs to be perfect or it gets relegated to a "that's neat" category and
promptly shut off.

When I talk to one of these things, it's downright painful. It's like speaking
to a someone who's (at least interacting in english, I'm sure its true of
other languages) primary language isn't english and they are just saying a
series of words without any meaning behind them. You tolerate this (although
its still annoying) because you're interacting with a human being on the other
end, not some white or beige box.

The issue behind this of course is these devices will likely never be able to
master intonation, because doing so would be a feat that would require clear
understanding of subtle context, far greater than what current NLP technology
can do, and may even require a general intelligence. It might be possible, I'm
not up to date on the current state of the art but certainly wouldn't be
computationally feasible in a consumer product any time soon.

Until then, I'll never buy or use one of these stupid voice interfaces. I can
get the same task done on my phone or whatever UI without the annoyance.

~~~
rlpb
I think the value of these systems is when you have your hands full, or when
getting out your phone or other UI is not convenient.

"Alexa, turn on the lights".

"Alexa, let the cat out".

"Alexa, did I lock the door?"

As soon as there are enough of these, it'll take off because it'll be useful.
None of these things need real intelligence. Sure, intonation won't be great.
But the convenience will override the imperfection.

~~~
ehnto
That's all I would ever want from an AI. I don't even need complicated
answers, just a repeat of the requested task and maybe a confirmation before
going ahead. More like air traffic control than a nuanced buttler.

That also lowers the possibility of it developing emotions and trying to
subvert global politics from my toaster.

------
snarf21
I don't get this rant. Alexa is still bleeding edge. It does some things
really well. It does some things really poorly. There are lots of things it
can't do. So the main complaint is that Alexa could be better, your point..?

To me, right now it excels as an interface when you are busy doing something
else. Ours is used most in the kitchen and living room. Timers, streaming
music/audio and basic facts all work great. Home automation is improving and
will get there as systems learn to play nice. That seems like a lot for $50,
but maybe that's just me...

The killer app hasn't been created yet (and possibly not even envisioned). I
can't wait until they are connected and I can issue a command to move
streaming from one device to another one in another room ("Alexa, pause for
Jim", "Alexa, continue for Jim").

I think the biggest downside of voice UI right now is a lack of
authentication. Someone outside the window could yell "Alexa, open the door".

~~~
010a
> I can't wait until they are connected and I can issue a command to move
> streaming from one device to another one in another room

Google Home can do this to a degree today. You are capable of saying things
like "Play X on my TV." if your TV is wired up with a ChromeCast.

In general, Google Home is very far ahead of Alexa. I agree with the opinion
that Alexa is a glorified radio, but I don't believe that opinion extends to
all devices in that class. I think its just because Alexa is overrated and not
very powerful.

~~~
notyourwork
You give a really vanilla use case and than suggest Google Home is superior.
Can you give me a use case where it actually demonstrates it is far ahead.

The Chromecast example isn't supporting your claim in my opinion.

~~~
Eridrus
Entertainment is the biggest use care for these devices IMO; Music and TV. I
haven't used an Echo in a while, but it had nothing for TV and wasn't that
great at music at the time. Does it have good support for both now?

~~~
tluyben2
I always try all these things as I am a junky like that but these things seem
to have such limited use cases. Looking up and playing things on chromecast,
for me, is faster using my phone than speech will ever be. So is controlling
things in the house and with a phone I can open the catflap without waking my
wife talking to Alexa. Switching on and off things is okish (phone or even a
normal lightswitch are still faster and less hassle imho), but trying to look
up what that great song from that obscure Norwegian black metal band was, of
which the name is something Alexa does not parse and will take me 10 minutes
to properly explain while it makes me sound like robot doing it; while via my
phone I google it in seconds. I am really not convinced if this is not just
gadgets because of gadgets. Or maybe I am just weird. Which is fine too.

~~~
Klathmon
Where it really shines for me is playing the latest podcast on YouTube or
continuing a Netflix show where I left off.

Being able to say "Watch Breaking bad on the living room TV" and have Netflix
pop-up and start playing right where I left off, or being able to say "play
the latest off topic podcast on the bedroom TV" and have it startup right away
is really nice.

I've also got a lot of home automation stuff so that combined with telling it
to turn lights on/off is fantastic.

My nightly routine is to tell it to turn the bedroom lights on, get ready for
bed, tell it to play the show I'm watching, then when I'm in bed and comfy
tell it to turn all lights off.

------
stuart78
While mine has never 'accidentally' ordered anything or yelled about internet
disconnect, I do agree with the conclusion that it ends up being a very
specific device. For me, that is a connected speaker with good sound that I
can gently manage from across the room. Good enough for me.

On another note, my 2 year old son has always had a complicated relationship
with 'her'. At one point, she red-ringed and would issue inscrutable messages
after long periods of spinning white. This really sent him into a tailspin and
it has taken several months for him to trust her again.

~~~
daveguy
This is fascinating. It hadn't dawned on me that very small children growing
up with these in their homes will have a very human response to them. A
relationship regardless of the actual intelligence of the device.

~~~
stuart78
Yeah, it is definitely a weird time we're moving into.

------
CWuestefeld
This article far exaggerates the devices problems, at least as I've
experienced it.

 _If someone shouts my name—Alex—across the apartment, it will activate Alexa_

That's trivially fixable. You can rename her to "Echo", "Amazon", or
"Computer".

 _sometimes Alexa will also be activated by arbitrary syllables in ordinary
conversation. ... As I read this paragraph aloud to myself, her blue ring has
already lit up several times_

I've had this happen at random (i.e., when I didn't say her name accidentally)
exactly once that I've noticed.

 _not only is Alexa incapable of looking up even basic facts_

This is an exaggeration. By all accounts Google's device does better. But it's
simply false that it can't look up "even basic facts". It's quite limited, but
far from absolutely useless.

In my mind, Alexa's greatest flaw is in the design for its skill interface.
You can't interact with her conversationally, because you always need to
preface every command with its skill name, e.g., "Alexa, ask Spaceman what's
the news today?" [1]. You must always remember these special names, and used
them in this stilted fashion for all interactions. And making this worse is
that Amazon insists that the interactions within each skill must be completely
discoverable, so that they don't want to publish more than a couple of samples
from each, encouraging you to experiment and discover yourself, a process I
find tiresome and one guaranteed to leave at least some of the capabilities
unknown.

[1] Shameless plug - this is a skill I wrote to give you news about scheduled
rocket launches, near earth object passes, and lunar phase -
[https://sites.google.com/view/spacemanforalexa/](https://sites.google.com/view/spacemanforalexa/)

~~~
zippergz
> That's trivially fixable. You can rename her to "Echo", "Amazon", or
> "Computer".

In my experience, this just changes the times that it accidentally triggers.
It doesn't actually _reduce_ how often it happens. Our triggers for random
crap all the time, both when we say stuff that sounds like "Alexa" and for
completely indecipherable reasons. We actually have two of them in our house,
and only one regularly goes of at the wrong time. I thought it might be
defective, so I swapped them, but then the other one started doing it. It's
location-dependent in our house, so it must have to do with the acoustics or
something. Regardless, it's annoying, and the less technical family members
are far less tolerant of this kind of stuff than I am.

All that said, I still agree that the article goes overboard in exaggeration.
Overall I like my Echos, and I think they work pretty well most of the time.
There's a lot of room for improvement, but it is a new product.

------
makecheck
I think they really need to work on how to report problems succinctly. A
simple error tone would be _fine_ , combined with some recognized follow-up
command like “what happened” or “tell me more”; in other words, assume by
default that the person probably just mumbled and is about to repeat the real
command.

Instead, Alexa likes to spew out multi-sentence explanations when there is a
problem, and trying to talk over all of _that_ to get Alexa’s attention again
is very irritating. Usually I end up trying to talk at the same time and it
may or may not listen. Imagine Alexa saying all of this kind of stuff: “I am
sorry, the Thing I Think You Asked Me About But You Did Not Actually Ask Me
About is not available right now. I cannot find a solution. Please go to
Amazon dot com slash Something Else You Most Definitely Did Not Ask About, and
visit the solutions web page.”. While all of that unnecessary verbiage is
being barked out, I am usually saying something like: “Alexa...Alexa...ALEXA,
turn on the...ALEXA, turn on the...ALEXA STOP!!! Alexa, turn on the lights.”.

------
Taylor_OD
I unplugged my Alexa after being woken up at night with Alexa yelling about
something or another too many times. It seemed like the perfect noise maker
that could also casually perform a limited number of other tasks and parlor
tricks when needed but the tech just isnt there.

It has a lot of issues hearing me when I want it to and yet somehow picks up
when I'm talking about a friend Alex from a room away. It's not quite as
disappointing as the Kindle Fire I bought but at least my girlfriend can use
that to watch movies on.

~~~
Animats
_I unplugged my Alexa after being woken up at night with Alexa yelling about
something or another too many times._

"Why isn't your desk in front of the telescreen?"

------
t0mbstone
I have an Amazon Echo in every room of my house, and I use it to control home
automation, such as all of my lights, my ecobee thermostat, and my entire home
theater (via a logitech harmony). I even use it to switch on and off my
humidifier and space heater (and manage the temperature). My wife and I also
use it to manage my shopping list (via the OurGroceries skill/app). I can use
it to remote start my car and preheat or cool it down in the morning. I can
even control my adjustable tempurpedic bed base, and have an IFTTT trigger
which makes my bed vibrate whenever my amazon echo alarm goes off in the
morning.

The possibilities are endless, and it's only going to get better.

~~~
JohnJamesRambo
Isn't it easier just to do that stuff with your hands?

~~~
zippergz
I have my home automation stuff hooked up to Alexa also, and no, it's not
always easier to do it with my hands. Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't. I
am often baffled by this "I'll just use the light switch" response to home
automation. It's not that you _can 't_ "just use the light switch," but there
are situations where it makes life measurably better to not have to. First
world problems, for sure, but they exist.

For example, if I'm sitting comfortably in my recliner and I decide I want to
watch a movie, it's pretty great to be able to tap a few buttons on my phone
to dim the lights without getting up. It's even better to now be able to say
"alexa, turn on movie lights" to do it without digging out and unlocking my
phone.

Or if I'm making dinner, feeling hot, and my hands are covered in tomato
juice, it's awfully nice to be able to adjust the air conditioner by voice.

These aren't life changing things, but they are pretty nice luxuries that have
increased my family's quality of life.

~~~
daveguy
> increased my family's quality of life.

Seriously, man? I get that you want to justify the thousands you spent on home
automation, but _come on_.

------
IgorPartola
Alexa is a voice interface, and a pretty good one at that. I use it primarily
for home automation and it works pretty well for that. There is not much
intelligence behind it in that regard, but it's very good at recognizing
commands, which is what is needed.

~~~
EnFinlay
The voice recognition is good, but the interface is completely independent of
Alexa. The interface is spawned from a group of people brainstorming all the
different ways someone can ask to turn on the lights, and then figuring out
the ways to deal with all the different inputs.

I'm not sure how common the knowledge is around making an Alexa skill, but I
made one as a side project so I might have some insight.

You define a bunch of variables, and describe what form they are likely to
come in (number, data, US city, list of strings). It's not strictly bound to
any enumeration you use. Then you list out a bunch of phrases that people are
expected to say to activate a function. You can pepper the variables into
these phrases. Then you link these phrases to functions, which receive the
variables as parameters. What you do from there is up to you.

I would say it's a clever way of gradually reducing the complexity, but it
does result in putting the "conversation" complexity on the developer. There
is no "state" or compound queries unless the developer thought of the
conversation going that way.

~~~
sahn44
Totally right. I've been building a skill and you quickly learn how un-magical
Alexa is. Most of the effort is engineering in fine detail to achieve some
degree of natural interaction for your users. For example, adding in state and
awareness of what the user said before to influence the skill's behavior and
response. It feels like I'm inventing all that from scratch rather than the
alexa platform helping achieve that.

If you want to see how well I've done, enable "NextSubway" :)

[https://www.amazon.com/Matt-Sahn-
NextSubway/dp/B01N9MO4DT/](https://www.amazon.com/Matt-Sahn-
NextSubway/dp/B01N9MO4DT/)

------
TheOneTrueKyle
One thing that I noticed that Alexa is helping me out in: Speaking up!

I have come to realize I mumble and talk low and cold heartless Alexa will
remind me to speak up.

That being said, I never thought of my Echo as anything other than a 1st step
towards something greater.

------
sly010
My favorite one:

Me: Alexa, set up an alarm for 2 minutes

Alexa: Two minutes.

[Two minutes later]

Alexa: Beep beep beep

Me: Alexa, thank you!

Alexa: You are welcome... Beep beep beep...

Edit: formatting

~~~
igravious
I spent a minute staring at this comment in puzzlement wondering what party to
the interaction this "Edit" person is and what hard drive they were formatting
while telling the world about it.

------
scosman
This article misses the point. Alexa is interesting because it's a new user
interface (voice + always listening), not because it's "an AI". Imo, it's the
biggest UI jump since the touchscreen phone. The tech that enables the UI will
continue to improve, but it doesn't need to be a general purpose
conversational AI to be successful.

------
josephjrobison
I've owned the Alexa since their first release. 80% of my request are the
weather for the day. Ask for the weather forecast the next few days and she
falls short. Other than that she's good for playing music on Spotify or
Pandora, and occasionally I'll ask for the time.

I haven't tried Google Home, but the fact that it will read the first search
result snippet as an answer seems light years ahead of Alexa.

Side-note: I just made the connection that Amazon bought Alexa.com the web
analytics company a long time, and has named Echo's personal assistant Alexa.
No coincidence, right? Although they never really mention it.

------
herbturbo
I only got the Dot a couple of weeks ago and for me it's worth the $50 just
for playing music. Anyone who thinks it is a "glorified radio clock" might
want to just take some time to think about exactly what it's doing. I'm kind
of amazed by it.

------
WheelsAtLarge
This article is a case of over expectations. Echo IS a great clock radio and
that's fine with me. The great part about it is the ability to access my
music. If I want to hear x all I have to do is ask for it. 5 years ago I would
never have had expected to be able to that for less than $50.00. Everything
else that comes with it is just icing on the cake. We are still years away, if
ever, from the Star Trek computer. And that's fine. Keep your expectations in
check and you can see that it's excellent technology --with a great future.

------
mark_l_watson
Well, a good point that there is no AI except for speech recognition, but,
overlooks the utility of hands-free operation. In scenarios like cooking, in
jacuzzi/bath/shower, or just when you are some distance from the device, it is
useful to control listening to audio books, music, NPR radio, etc., my family
owns two Echoes and get good use from them.

------
njharman
The title is making the assumption that the future of AI isn't glorified radio
clock.

Also, what's definition of "future". Academic research paper or project? Or,
something deployed and used by millions. I tend towards the later. And by that
metric the future is now.

------
yaur
I don't have the Amazon stuff, but do mostly control hue with Siri and

> in order to use the Hue bulbs with Alexa, you must relinquish all use of
> manual light switches.

Isn't fully true. We have smart dimmers that can be placed in better spots
since they are battery powered.

------
SomewhatLikely
Mine has largely been relegated to "decent non-portable Bluetooth speaker".
Google's Home doesn't even support Bluetooth, but you can "cast" to it.

------
mafro
This guy seems to be most upset about not being able to search Google
verbally. Alexa has its skills, but random search is not its finest display of
talent (Bing?)

------
Animats
What did you expect? Its primary purpose is ordering stuff.

------
jbae29
I use it mainly to set timers while I'm cooking. So a little better than a
radio clock but I don't think it's worth it.

~~~
azinman2
Yet you can't name the timers, so it's easy to forget which is which when you
set timers staggered throughout cooking at different intervals (even more
exacerbated if you dare try to time things to generally come together at the
same time).

Ironically this has been +1'd so many time on Amazon's own forums... starting
years ago.

------
ignorantguy
I stopped setting alarms on alexa, since it does not stop when I ask it to
stop. I had to unplug it once which was really annoying.

------
caycep
what about it being the trojan horse of AI, to get Amazon's foot in the door
for its eventual successor?

~~~
anigbrowl
You need to put the payload inside the vehicle before you deliver it. Your
chances of successfully installing it later fall asymptotically towards zero.

~~~
burrows
Remote update.

~~~
anigbrowl
...which is why your phone keeps getting slower, as it's loaded with code
written for better models as a way of marketing their superior capacity. Same
reason you can't fit a jet engine to a biplane and expect good performance.

------
blubb-fish
52 comments and nobody mentions the NSA.

Are you people aware that this is essentially a glorified bug?

~~~
slantaclaus
I was at a multifamily technology conference in San Diego last year and during
a panel with some 'experts', brought up the concern of devices like Amazon
Echo recording people's conversations. The lady who responded misunderstood me
and chimed in within something like: "you know, I haven't even thought of
that. There are many opportunities for revenue with this technology". But that
was an evil uber-landlord, not sure where Amazon stands on this. If they want
to increase adoption for this technology, they better come up with a solid
privacy policy and stand behind it.

~~~
blubb-fish
A policy won't help against the NSA.

And technologically the language processing "necessarily" takes place in the
cloud. For that everything you say needs to be sent through the web. Amazon
will store everything they can for the purpose of later using this as a
training data set.

~~~
mercer
> And technologically the language processing "necessarily" takes place in the
> cloud.

Is that actually true? And if so, how far are we from being able to do this on
the device itself?

