I'm not sure that price is going to be a blocker. The audience may not think of price as the main thing here, they may think of openness and non-vendor lockin and privacy and security as pretty amazing things for that price.
I myself am getting tired AF of Google Assistant and their devices. So so tired of saying "Hey Google". And I have a Lenovo device with Google on it that was decent, the Google pushed an update to it and all video calls have an echo on them now making it entirely unusable. There are multiple threads on the internet about it too and Lenovo support says "contact Google" and Google says nothing on those threads, zilch. I don't trust Google devices anymore, they get abandoned routinely. I wish they didn't but I feel more empowered with an open device than I do with closed source, no public response Google stuff.
I'm definitely curious about trying a Mycroft now, and I think there may be others too. It may not be the masses but it might be enough to keep the project thriving.
I myself am getting tired AF of Google Assistant and their devices. So so tired of saying "Hey Google". And I have a Lenovo device with Google on it that was decent, the Google pushed an update to it and all video calls have an echo on them now making it entirely unusable. There are multiple threads on the internet about it too and Lenovo support says "contact Google" and Google says nothing on those threads, zilch. I don't trust Google devices anymore, they get abandoned routinely. I wish they didn't but I feel more empowered with an open device than I do with closed source, no public response Google stuff.
I'm definitely curious about trying a Mycroft now, and I think there may be others too. It may not be the masses but it might be enough to keep the project thriving.