[schwabacher]

Echo seems really smart to me - the reason Amazon is in hardware is because they are terrified of 'ok google, order me lighbulbs', or 'hey siri, i need a new pair of socks' becoming the way people shop for things online.

Amazon made Echo for 'alexa, order me wheat thins', and all the question answering and music playing is just window dressing.

[cwilson]

I really don't think being terrified of competition is a good reason to create something, so I hope that's not why they are doing this.

I'm struggling to find a reason why ordering anything via Echo is a good idea. I wouldn't use Siri to order anything, so I'm not sure why I'd want to do this either. I like to research things before I buy them and so do most Amazon users (even if it's a quick glimpse at the overall rating). Do I have to have a long Q/A session with Echo to determine which specific type of socks I'd like it to order? It seems faster to just do this myself via my phone or laptop.

I'm not going to switch to Google Shopping because I can tell my phone to order things. I use Amazon because Amazon is the best place to buy things (for numerous reasons), and until that changes talking to my phone or a device in my house ins't going to effect this decision.

This just feels like a solution that no one was asking for, and that's generally the worst kind of product.

Edit: After multiple people pointed out that this WOULD be useful for re-ordering certain types of things (mainly food/kitchen stuff), I agree it would be useful for that purpose. That said, I think Amazon should be marketing this with that in mind, and the first place this should live is your kitchen, not your living room.

[jedberg]

> I'm not going to switch to Google Shopping because I can tell my phone to order things.

Have you tried Google shopping with Voice integration? It's pretty amazing. You say "Ok google, buy me Triscuts" and four hours later, there's Triscuts at the door.

If my grandpa were still alive I would totally set him up with this.

[schwabacher]

I am asking for it - I think online shopping is one of those those things, like driving to the store, where you will not realize how annoying it was until you no longer have to do it.

I definitely would like to read reviews and compare prices when buying a big ticket item like a tv or computer, but for repetitive or impulse purchases I would love to be able to make them with the least amount of friction possible.

[mgkimsal]

"I'm struggling to find a reason why ordering anything via Echo is a good idea"

I agree.

But reordering things...

[waterlesscloud]

Amazon pretty clearly has a mid-range strategy of being the place you order groceries and consumables as a first choice. Weaseling into your household with Echo is a likely part of that. No research needed when you're ordering the same Wheat Thins and toothpaste you've ordered a dozen times before.

I also think the drones are for this small, frequently ordered stuff.

[cwyers]

Almost everyone who would be in the market for this kind of a device already has something in their pocket with access to Google Now or Siri, though. Why use Echo when you have to be in a certain room?

[vidarh]

Because when you're in that room you don't need to get your device out of your pocket?

But I don't buy that almost everyone will have it in their pocket, given the number of times I see people looking for their phones all over the place.

[cwyers]

$200 is an awful lot to spend to keep from having to look for your phone while in just one room of your house.

[unclebucknasty]

Right. It also struck me as funny in the video that the Echo had moved into their bedroom. Did they buy two? Or are they carting the thing around the house with them (instead of their phones)?

[vidarh]

Lots of people spend far more than that on fairly frivolous things.

[cwyers]

How does the Echo even rise to the standard of frivolity? A far better word for it is "superfluous."

[vidarh]

Still, I have far more than $200 worth of electronics I have no immediate use for lying around.

[13]

Does that really function? If I order socks audibly, I have no idea what I'm going to get. It's a lot more efficient to look through a page of images than to describe all the intricacies of my sock preferences via text to speech.

[damian2000]

The idea is that the app would have some pre configured items that you've previously ordered - i.e. it already knows the brand, size, supplier, delivery method, etc. Its just providing a shortcut to place the order itself. I see this useful in regularly occuring basket items like food/groceries.

[r00fus]

> the reason Amazon is in hardware is because they are terrified of 'ok google, order me lighbulbs'

If that's the case, they should worry about Google Shopping Express and same-day delivery vs. 2-day after it's shipped. When Google does roll it out to most US metros, they likely are going to add it as an option to "Ok Google". And in a few hours, your order will be on your doorstep.

I mean, Amazon's delivery chain is absolutely amazing, but it simply can't compete with local delivery.

[vidarh]

> they should worry about Google Shopping Express and same-day delivery vs. 2-day after it's shipped.

I'm sure they do. And I'm sure something will happen in the US too. Meanwhile in the UK, Amazon has started rolling out their own delivery depots to complement their large warehouses, and leaving partners to do local delivery from their depots instead of the full end-to-end delivery.

Recently they announced that as a part result of this, they've signed a deal with a retail magazine distributor to deliver your packages to local shops etc. for pickup.

Not quite Google Shopping Express - yet - but it means that you can shortly get your packages in ~12 hours nearly UK wide, from an inventory my local stores can't compete with, because they're constrained by the cost of retail space.

> I mean, Amazon's delivery chain is absolutely amazing, but it simply can't compete with local delivery.

Most of what I've ordered from Amazon over the last year isn't available from local shops. A lot of it isn't even available from Amazons UK warehouses, and end up getting drop-shipped from other parts of the world. That's what stops me from going other places: Amazon aggregates a whole lot of sources that extends the products available to me far beyond what a service that aggregates local companies can.

And I bet that following the rollout of their local depots, they'll start predictively moving stock of their best selling products ahead of time to cut times further. Especially since the more they push through those depots, the more flexibility they will have in route scheduling for the last leg delivery to cut delivery times even further.

[damian2000]

How are they solving the problem of people in the same room with different accents... that sounds like a really hard one to figure out. Google Voice needs some training for example just to be able to recognise the initial "Ok, Google".

[vidarh]

I have a broad Scandinavian accent, my Fire TV still understood me right out of the box.

I was long very negative on the short/medium term potential for speech recognition, but while I still don't use it very often, it's convenient in enough situations that I use it now and again.