| > but for a simple alarm or a timer, who would require online connectivity.... It's about the experience and ease of use. Sure I can set timers on my phone all day long or lookup conversions but the experience sucks compared to a voice interface. Open solutions like Alice, Mycroft, and Ada all kinda suck unless you leverage the same online services powering Google, Siri, and Alexa. We have Amazon Echos and these are some of the situations where a voice assistant just works better than anything else: - You're standing at the kitchen counter multiplying a recipe. It is easier and faster to say "Alexa, how many tablespoons is 9 teaspoons?" than almost anything else. - You're making Thanksgiving dinner. "Alexa, set a mashed potato timer for 20 minutes. How much time is left on the Turkey Basting Timer?" - The dentist recommends brushing your teeth for 2 minutes, I setup a routine so when my kiddo is brushing their teeth they can say "Alexa, I'm brushing my teeth." And Alexa will say "Starting the tooth timer" then make a silly noise every 30 seconds to indicate they need to switch brushing top inside to top outside to bottom inside to bottom outside. - I'm wood working in the garage and need to multiply a dimension. You can't beat screaming "Alexa, what's 24 times 9/16ths?" and getting your answer without having to lookup from what you're doing, find your phone, or do the math in your head. - You're putting the kiddo to bed and got home late from practice. So you both decide to let them sleep in a little. It's easier to say "Alexa, cancel the 6:30 alarm and set an alarm for 7 am." and Alexa might ask "Do you want to cancel all alarms or just tomorrow's" and you say "Just tomorrow's". No fiddling with the Alarm clock or remembering to adjust it the next evening. |