Dan Moren, Six Colors:
At present, there’s certainly not much to recommend the Home to people who already own an Echo or Echo Dot. Most of what the Home can do, the Echo can do just as well, with the exception of translation and Chromecast support.
Those on the fence about which smart speaker to buy have a less enviable decision. Both are attractive, well-made devices in their own way, and both will scratch that itch of a ubiquitous assistant at your constant beck and call. To date, the Echo remains the heavyweight champion of the market, thanks to its deep bench of features and third-party skills, but it would be unwise to underestimate Google’s resources and expertise if the company decides this is a field where it wants to devote its energy.
It’s early days for the always-on, stay-at-home assistant. One thing that is clear: Google Home and Amazon Echo are extensions of their relative ecosystems. If and when Apple builds one, I expect their fixed assistant to favor Apple’s ecosystem, too.
A pity, that. If I were to hire an assistant, I would never hire someone who had to check the branding involved before they could help me with a particular task. The divisions are getting deeper.
“A pity, that. If I were to hire an assistant, I would never hire someone who had to check the branding involved before they could help me with a particular task.”
That’s the kind of insight that keeps me coming back to the site! Well spotted; well put.
What about hiring an assistance who will report what you do to it’s real employer.
It’s also nice that insight like that isn’t followed by a call for Apple to get into the smart speaker market immediately or it risks irrelevancy.
I received an Amazon Echo Dot this Christmas – as an Apple fan I was sceptical. This thing is fantastic. The voice recognition is beyond anything I have used previously from either Apple or Google. The device is quick and responsive and able to hear you from across the room even when playing music etc. I have even taken out a subscription to Amazon Music unlimited family and it is amazing how well this is integrated. Highly recommended. Apple has some serious catching up to do.
What sorts of tasks do you accomplish with it?
I assume it’s incompatible with Apple Music?
It is great for catching up with the news – you can configure where you want it to grab the news from and then just ask it to play your flash briefing. Great for music as I said and listening to radio stations via a free Tunein service. It offers a freely available API so it can be integrated into other services and offered as skills which you can enable. One such simple example is ‘ British History Quiz’ – you ask Alexa to open the app and you then get asked multiple questions and choose your answer. So simple yet fun. It has fantastic interfacing into smart appliances which I am investigating at the moment. Mainly though the best part is just the natural way you can communicate with the Alexa service- having struggled to really find a use for Siri over the last couple of years I find that Alexa is much more advanced and forgiving of the structure of your phrases unlike Siri.
So far I haven’t heard much value add. There’s no way I would find listening to the news valuable when I can scan the news much faster on a screen. And music streaming I already do w/ Siri and my ATV or BT speakers. Echo can’t playback Apple Music libraries/content, right?
I mean it sounds like it listens better, but I don’t yet see what I would do with it that I can’t now.
Ok not going to argue with you about it. It does not integrate with Apple Music. It works better than Siri has ever done and I can use while preparing dinner/washing dishes or when otherwise unable to use my phone/iPad. I am looking to purchase two more to have the capabilities it provides around the home. Apple are well behind in this field – they need to move quickly otherwise they’ll find it very difficult to enter and compete.
I’m a bit skeptical that there is going to be a ton of lock-in in these ecosystems as they are currently situated. An Alexa Skill is a very thin wrapper around a web API call. It will not be remotely difficult for companies to make their services available on multiple voice assistants. These voice-apps need to be a lot more complex than a simple HTTP request if Amazon or Google hopes to build an ecosystem moat.
Well you can’t say Apple is way behind but make a compelling case in what… The only useful sounding use case you’ve mentioned is playing music — which Siri already does, and can do for Apple Music and iTunes content to boot, which Echo cannot. So I don’t see how that is a compelling advantage to the Echo.
So far the only “better” column I’m reading is it can hear you better in the room.
I can claim what I like thanks. I have been an Apple user since the 80’s despite working in the corporate world of IT. Do not underestimate the convenience of having a device always on and ready around the home. The integration with the music is far beyond what Siri can do – for example if I can’t remember the title of a song I can say ‘Alexa, play the song with the lyric…..’. Believe me having a voice attendant that actually works with natural speech patterns. Lastly if you want further proof of how good this device is – google for Echo Dot reviews. You will find many that are glowing. Amazon are being smart – they have built an entire stack of web services with AWS and an open approach. There are a large number of community based websites that are using these technologies – they are building a groundswell of consensus in the voice market. Just look.