Amazon Echo Club

[mlewis78]

Originally Posted by ApK

Stop telling it to PAIR. You only tell it to PAIR with a device ONCE. From then on, tell it to CONNECT to your laptop. CONNECTING is different than PAIRING.

Thanks for responding. From what the Amazon rep told me, I was having a problem because I was uisng the app on my laptop, which disrupts the bluetooth connection. Not sure if he is correct, but I will go along with that and see how it goes. When he gave me instructions to get it connected, he had me do the usual thing that I say: "Alexa, pair with bluetooth" (at first it was still saying "searching").

I will use my phone Alexa app if I just want to play music or radio with the app. My echo rarely understands my requests to play music from my library Usually "can't find it" or plays samples of music that I don't want to hear.

Last night when I went to use the Alexa app on my phone, it updated and asked for my phone number, etc., for the calling feature that I will probably not use. Tonight it was intermittently glowing green and I asked it why it was turning green and it said it means I have a message and I should ask for the message. The message was that it was connected to my phone and I should let my family/friends who have an echo to get the app so we could make calls through it. Hardly anyone in my real life has an echo, certainly no one who I call.

[tubemonkey]

Consumers are lukewarm on Amazon's Echo Look

Amazon's recently released Echo Look is unlikely to gain mass market adoption, according to exclusive survey data from BI Intelligence. An overwhelming 82% of the survey's respondents said they're unlikely to buy it, and only 3% said they’d buy it as soon as they can. While the Look was announced just weeks ago, our survey respondents tend to be early adopters of technology, signaling that the Echo Look may have even less intial appeal to mass market consumers.

Like the newly announced Echo Show, the Look is an expansion of the current Echo device. It boasts full Alexa functionality, but with an added camera that lets users take pictures using voice commands. The press release describes the Look as a way for users to get quick fashion advice by uploading pictures to a “lookbook” in the companion app, which provides a Style Check feature that can rate two outfits using artificial intelligence (AI) and fashion specialists. The app will also provide product recommendations based on a consumer's personal lookbook.

[tubemonkey]

Google Home to the Amazon Echo: 'Anything you can do...'

At Google's developer conference, the search giant matched and surpassed all of the Echo's recent upgrades.

The battle between the Google Home and the Amazon Echo keeps getting better and better. Yesterday, a year after Google first announced the Home and the Google Assistant, the search giant might have just shown the road map to put the Home ahead for good.

To this point, the Google Home smart speaker has lagged behind Amazon's competing Echo devices in terms of the things it can do. Amazon had a head start with Echo, bringing it to the market in 2014, and as a result, the Echo has more than 10,000 skills and works directly with dozens of internet connected hardware products. The Google Home only started with four device partners, but it has been catching up.

Since the Home speaker debuted last year, Google has quietly added and improved on a number of features -- flexible voice commands for controlling connected household devices, conversational recipe instructions in the kitchen, and personal assistance tied to your Google Calendar and Google Maps account. At its Google I/O developer's conference in Mountain View, California, Google added abilities that will be hard for Amazon to match, and announced better versions of a couple of Echo's recent upgrades.

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

Consumers are lukewarm on Amazon's Echo Look

I'm not surprised by this estimate of failure. I should think that anything the Echo Look can do can be done better and more mobile on a typical smartphone. I should think that the people most likely to want to share pictures of themselves wearing various fashion items would prefer to ask their friends what they think rather than asking a moron like Alexa.

[tubemonkey]

Advertising and Alexa

Customers expect a delightful and personalized experience on Alexa, and it is our top priority to maintain that experience. Companies, designers, and developers are paramount to creating that unique and compelling voice experience, and we encourage continued innovation.
With that in mind, today we are clarifying our policy on advertising in Alexa skills. Our goal is to maintain the customer experience that Alexa users have come to expect while providing better guidelines for developers looking to innovate. The intention of these new updates is to make it clearer what’s acceptable while ensuring our developers have the details they need to build skills that will pass certification.

Advertising in Alexa Skills

To ensure a delightful experience for customers and provide clear guidance to developers, our new policy is as follows:
Your skill will be rejected if it includes or otherwise surfaces advertising or promotional messaging. There are specific exceptions we will allow:

• Streaming music, streaming radio, podcast, and flash briefing skills may include audio advertisements as long as (1) the advertisements do not use Alexa’s voice or a similar voice, refer to Alexa, or imitate Alexa interactions, and (2) the skill does not include more or materially different advertising than is included when the same or similar content is made available outside of Alexa.
• Skills that allow customers to order products or services (e.g. order a pizza) may include audio messaging promoting those products or services.
• Skills may include audio messaging informing customers of promotional offers or deals in response to specific requests from end users (e.g., “Alexa, ask [skill name] what deals are available today”).
• Skills that are specifically designed to promote a product or service (e.g., a car wash skill intended to promote that business) may include audio messaging promoting that product or service.

This policy is subject to change over time. You can always read the latest advertising policy in full here.

Developer Success with Alexa

We realize that skill builders invest time and resources to build engaging skills for Alexa. We have two programs that help developers reduce costs and earn a return on their investment. First, we offer a program that makes it free for Alexa developers to build and host most Alexa skills using AWS. In addition, on Monday, we began rewarding our game developers for their skills in the US, the UK, and Germany. Developers of top-performing game skills can earn money for their games based on customer usage. We will continue to explore ways for developers to monetize in the future while maintaining the best possible experience for our customers. Learn more here.

We Value Your Feedback

Voice User Interface (VUI) design is an exciting field, and developers like you have already created more than 12,000 skills with the Alexa Skills Kit. As we learn more about this burgeoning space and explore the realm of possibilities, we will update our processes and requirements. I'll share news and updates as they happen, aiming to be responsive, consistent, and transparent along the way. We’d love your feedback, so please send us your thoughts on Alexa certification anytime using our contact form.

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

Advertising and Alexa

Protecting us customers from too much unwanted advertising...NOT! Every damn device Amazon makes is filled with advertising. Even the Kindles, which should be for reading, are filled with features that are designed to get us to buy more books. The Look was designed to sell clothing and related items. The FireTV was designed to sell us overpriced videos. Alexa was designed to sell everything they could think of to us. Amazon does not build a device that doesn't push advertising down our throats and up our backsides. We consumers are like a giant balloon that has been over-inflated with their ads, and are not far from popping. I appreciate Amazon trying to keep their skills under control a bit, but that is like the pot calling the kettle black. That is as silly as PBS insisting they are an ad free network even though they slip in lots of ads and spend weeks at a time begging us to no end to donate. Personally I would rather listen to ads than begging. I understand that ads are necessary, and ads are a part of our lives, like it or not. But Amazon, Google, Facebook, et cetera have taken them to a whole new level of annoyance.

[Conan46]

Honestly, those guidelines seem pretty fair for app developers.
Amazon already slips in ads trying to up-sell me to an audible subscription when I ask it to read one of my ebooks. So far there is nothing obnoxious. I do hope it stays that way and Amazon can resist trying to shove its services down our throats. That is one thing that could turn me against using Alexa. But so far nothing I have seen has been problematic--just hope it stays that way.

[tubemonkey]

Originally Posted by Conan46

Honestly, those guidelines seem pretty fair for app developers.
Amazon already slips in ads trying to up-sell me to an audible subscription when I ask it to read one of my ebooks. So far there is nothing obnoxious. I do hope it stays that way and Amazon can resist trying to shove its services down our throats. That is one thing that could turn me against using Alexa. But so far nothing I have seen has been problematic--just hope it stays that way.

I hope it stays that way too. Time will tell.

[tubemonkey]

x-posted from the Deals Forum:

• $39.99 -- Echo Dot 2 --> reg $49.99 --> details --> exp unknown

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

x-posted from the Deals Forum:

• $39.99 -- Echo Dot 2 --> reg $49.99 --> details --> exp unknown

That is a good deal. I think the Dot 2 is the best bang for the buck among the Echo, Tap, and Dot. I assume the same when you consider the two new devices as well--the Show and the Look.

BTW, I still haven't heard any specs for the screen on the Show. I'm assuming it will be low resolution at perhaps 1024 x 600 px just like the new Fire 7" model.

I've got a Dot on the night stand next to my bed. This morning around 5:00am I had turned over with my eyes facing the Dot and I must have been somewhere between sleep and awake when the Dot apparently updated its FW. At first I thought I was dreaming as these blue lights flickered through my eyelids, but then I sleepily opened my eyes and saw the Blue lit ring on the Dot doing its update dance. Arggghhhh! I wonder if there is a way to tell the Dot to behave between certain hours. I can set my iPhone to not ring or ping from calls, text messages, etc. between specified times. This is the first time Dot annoyed me awake, and I don't want it to become a thing with her. I guess I could place a cloth over her at night to keep the blue light from disturbing me. She made no sounds BTW. But setting a no update or interrupt time period would be better.

ETA: I found this link with instructions for scheduling Do Not Disturb on Alexa devices, but I suspect it only prevents calls and messages from disturbing me. It seems to have very limited functionality.

Turn on Do Not Disturb for Alexa

Do Not Disturb keeps Alexa from alerting you with unscheduled alerts. You can activate Do Not Disturb on your Alexa device by voice or through the Alexa app.

Do Not Disturb blocks Alexa from alerting you with:

• Calls
• Messages

Compatible Devices:

• Amazon Echo
• Echo Dot

To turn ON Do Not Disturb say, "Don't disturb me."

To turn OFF Do Not Disturb say, "Turn off Do Not Disturb."

To schedule Do Not Disturb for specific days and times in the Alexa app:

1. Select Settings from the Menu.
2. Select your device.
3. Under Do Not Disturb, select Scheduled.
4. Use the slider to turn on or off Do Not Disturb.
5. Select Edit to change the time Do Not Disturb begins or ends.
6. Select Save Changes.

Note: Do Not Disturb doesn't prevent scheduled alerts such as timers and alarms. Do Not Disturb is not available on Alexa-enabled devices from manufacturers other than Amazon.

[Blossom]

I've always noticed Alexa only does firmware updates late at night or early morning however you look at it. I'm a night owl so I've been awake to see this a few times. I got mine way back in February 2015

Sent from my XT1528

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by Blossom

I've always noticed Alexa only does firmware updates late at night or early morning however you look at it. I'm a night owl so I've been awake to see this a few times. I got mine way back in February 2015

Sent from my XT1528

I think most things are set to update in the middle of the night so as not to interfere with normal usage.

The middle of the night FW update certainly makes sense, but considering a lot of Alexa Echos, Dots, and Taps are placed next to people's beds, this is another oversight on Bezo's Bozos. I wish those bozos actually used the devices, then a lot of this stuff would be clear to them. This isn't rocket science by any means. They only need to add a do not disturb during xx time period feature with two options:

• Mute Sounds [Yes / No]
• Disable Ring Light [Yes / No]

[tubemonkey]

Amazon begins sending out Echo Look invitations

This device will be a big flop for Amazon. Whatever were they smokin'?

Amazon has started sending out invitations to purchase the Echo Look, their new Alexa powered “style assistant” with a built-in camera and speaker. I’ve just received an invitation myself and other readers have informed me that they received one today as well. While I’m probably not the demographic this device was intended for, nor are most of you, I’ve taken one for the team and bought one to review. Look for an article soon, fashion selfies and all, with my detailed overview and opinions on what is easily Amazon’s strangest device.