
Amazon Echo Look – Hands-Free Camera and Style Assistant - jeremyrwelch
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0186JAEWK
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mintplant
_By sitting in the alcove, and keeping well back, Winston was able to remain
outside the range of the Amazon® Echo Look™, so far as sight went. He could be
heard, of course, but so long as he stayed in his present position he could
not be seen._

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blhack
Isn't there a pretty big difference between something installed by your
government, that is illegal to disable or shut off, and something that you
willingly install and turn on?

Just where I'm sitting right now, there are at least 3 cameras pointed at me.
My laptop, my girlfriend's laptop, and the camera on my phone, but they're all
(with reasonable probability) turned off right now.

Implying that _this_ is comparable to the videoscreens talked about in 1984,
when it really isn't, means that if there ever _is_ something similar to that,
people will be a lot less receptive to criticism of it. Boy who cried wolf an
all that.

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mintplant
I mean, it's a joke. But to your point, I could imagine a product becoming
popular, then ubiquitous, then effectively mandatory and exploited for
control. There's Sesame Credit in China which is applying this to social
networking (look it up, it's a terrifying idea). State involvement isn't
necessary: see Facebook ("Why don't you have a Facebook?" in any social
situation, or the reported trend of employers asking to see prospective hires'
accounts), or smartphones (loaded with surveillance libraries from adtech
companies).

* Also, they weren't "videoscreens" in 1984 but "telescreens", producing audio while recording and transmitting audio and video. That happens to match the Echo Look, form factor excepted.

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blhack
Last time this was posted, people thought it was a joke, because who would
ever want this thing?

My sisters and my mom would _absolutely_ use this thing. I'm sure they would
think it was really, really cool.

(Granted, that is only 2 in 5 sisters, I'm sure the other 3 would think it was
silly)

Never forget that you live in a bubble. Better yet, try to identify the
boundaries of your bubble, and try to move outside of them.

~~~
hiddencost
+1. If this is confusing to you, you haven't spent very long evaluating an
entire outfit as an ensemble, in a three foot tall mirror. I'm guessing most
of the detractors don't realize _just how many_ people spend on the order of
at least a couple hours a week figuring out how they look. This is going to
sell like hotcakes.

------
King-Aaron
"I'm sorry Dave, that belt doesn't go with your shirt"

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TheSpiceIsLife
Also posted seven days ago, see here
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14203594](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14203594)

It appears the Echo Look is available by invitation only. Has anyone been able
to get their hands on one?

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ryandvm
After Twitter, emoji, AirBnB, the resurgence of GIFs, and President Trump; I
have admitted to myself that I have absolutely no aptitude for predicting
success.

That said, this is _surely_ going to flop...

~~~
nom
Something tells me it's not going to flop and they'll sell at least a couple
10k devices. They know what they are doing, even if we can't understand it.

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apricot13
I can see what they are trying to do with this but the sort of person who
takes outfit photos doesn't just take 1 photo they take 200 (and in different
locations) and they certainly wont post it to social media without heavily
editing it first.

The only use I can think for it is a convenient way to track which outfits you
wear so you can remember what you paired with what but you could just as
easily hold your phone in your hand and take a quick photo without the faff of
syncing to get the photos on your phone!

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nom
I can understand Amazon Echo. I have one, even though I'm aware of the risks
and most of the time am really paranoid about such things, I still use it (for
playing music and setting timers or getting news/weather).

I can't, however, understand the Echo Look. I know people like to take selfies
and have no problem blasting them out into the internet, but I think Amazon is
really playing the risk card here. A camera watching you undress.. what could
go wrong?!

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coralreef
Does anyone have insight on how or why this product appeals to its target
audience? Seems like a selfie app on the phone could achieve just the same?

~~~
criddell
I think it's a pretty good idea. I notice how well people dress all the time,
yet I'm terrible at dressing myself.

There's a store near where I live (it's a national chain) where you can set up
an appointment to go in, be measured, and try a bunch of stuff on. They check
each item to see how well it fits then help you pick things that fit well and
look good together. They let me know that I've been buying clothes that were
way too big for me.

If I could have a device in my home and get that kind of advice on demand, I'd
buy one in a heartbeat.

If Amazon can pull this off, it's going to be disruptive to say the least. As
I understand it, the back end is a mix of machine learning and human
experts/trainers. They are going to get thousands of images from similar
cameras, at the same resolution, framed in a similar way. That's machine
learning gold. Amazon will see what I have and then be able to make
suggestions of more clothes that I should buy. If this takes off, it's going
to put a lot of clothing retailers out of business. If I were running Gap, I'd
be a little scared because there's no way they can compete. The best they can
do is hope Amazon will sell their clothes.

I'm not convinced though, that Amazon _can_ pull it off. Not yet, anyway.

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BEEdwards
I feel like I'm missing a trick here.

I'm just clearly not the demographic for this, because though the echo is a
popular device, damned if I can figure out what the hell its use case is *that
the phone in your pocket can't already do.

This adds a camera to the formula and I'm more confused.

So they're building a modern cellular telephone in reverse?

~~~
cocktailpeanuts
There are plenty of use cases on that website, such as being able to use it as
a mirror alternative. I'm a male and I still can see that it can be
beneficial.

If you still can't see the benefit, then you really probably are not the
target audience as you say.

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mirimir
How secure is Echo? I presume that it uses HTTPS. But let's say that your LAN
is pwned. Could an adversary MitM the connection, and exfiltrate traffic? I
can imagine lulz.

~~~
nom
I assume they adhere to best practices, so no, MitM shouldn't be possible. If
they don't we would've heard about it already.

~~~
mirimir
OK, but can Echo accommodate enterprise security best practices, which would
_require_ that HTTPS be MitMed?

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jeremyrwelch
A dedicated selfie cam that you can also talk to? I anticipate great success.
And then massive backlash from the next gen.

