Reader for 96yo technophobe? (that I can load books on remotely from our library)

[shalym]

Originally Posted by Quoth

No, those are completely different. Also different from each other. You can't seriously believe that.
Twitter: Human generated content and inept adverts and other posts in your timeline.
CNN: Simply a web site.
Netflix: Simple database front end to video streaming.
I don't even know what you mean by "Hilton Hotels". Their booking system? Or have they got an in house ordering app simulating a concierge? That's far simpler than Alexa, Cortana, Siri or Google Go, but could use one of them as a backend.

Obviously common commands are curated ages ago and in the pattern matching database (a process dishonestly called "Machine Learning").
That kind of thing was available 25 years ago and doesn't need the Internet, but Alexa needs the internet because the database is on a remote Amazon server, though you can test if it caches by disconnecting internet and seeing do any commands work.

Wait. I'm sorry for going off topic, but I need clarification on something. Quoth, are you saying that you truly believe that Amazon employs 1,000s of people who's job is listening to the questions that people ask Alexa, then answering those questions?

Shari

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by shalym

Wait. I'm sorry for going off topic, but I need clarification on something. Quoth, are you saying that you truly believe that Amazon employs 1,000s of people who's job is listening to the questions that people ask Alexa, then answering those questions?

Shari

It's very much more complicated than that, but all so-called AI/Machine Learning is actually human curated content feeding databases used for pattern matching. So your random question is never answered in real time by human listeners, but the system needs thousands of human "curators" to main performance. Without them the service will degrade. That's why Amazon is making 1000s redundant in Alexa division as that doesn't really make money. It will degrade to late 1990s quality of text to speech creating queries on a search engine.

I started researching so called AI in late 1970s and AI was the reason I took up programming. I've been on courses on AI and visited one company producing Expert Systems (the old name for "AI"-"Neural Networks"-"Machine Learning").
Specifically I've also done a bit of research on Chatbots, which are not quite the same thing as Alexa as most are either entertainment, attempt at therapy, fake social media accounts selling stuff or propaganda or customer service.

[crossi]

I would really recommend an echo. I wish I had had it for my elderly father who had macular degeneration. He couldn't even read a clock. Alexa can give the time, day of the week, weather, time a nearby store opens and its phone numbers, as well as read audio books and play music on demand. It does need a server but once set up you could put the laptop in a closet or take it home with you.

Talk to your library. My library system had special players about the size of a tape recorder. People who were legally blind like those with macular degeneration, could get them. The player had a few really big button controls with distinctive shapes. It would read aloud the titles of the books or magazine loaded on a usb stick and open and read the one chosen. I managed his library account for him, downloading from the website and adding or removing from the usb stick. I suppose you could mail them to her if you are not nearby. He really enjoyed the Economist which very kindly made itself free to the legally blind. Her local library system might have other suggestions as well as The Society For The Blind.

For a kindle or oasis have you considered setting up a child account for her. The only books she would see on her kindle are those you put in the child account profile. You should be able to add and remove remotely.

[lovetoRL]

What did you decide to go with?

[Asawi]

My two cents if you haven't already made up your mind:
Involve someone else in the "scheme"! Surely your MIL doesn't lives a hermit life on a desert island where noone else is welcome someone closer to her can help with book transfer a couple of times a month (or whatever timeframe would be good).
After all, there will be need for internet connection somewhere along the line between you and her reader. That other person doen't have to know anything about Calibre och ebooks in gereral. If they have a laptop they can download books that you send as email attachments and then bring the laptop to her and transfer the books through USB.
Maybe this way of doing it isn't for, but I would suggest you start thinking along the way of involving someone else. It would make things so much easier!
As for the hardware, I don't know a lot about the current options, but I think physical page turning buttons would be good. If 7" screen size is enough the Kobo Libra 2 is very comfortable to hold withe the large bezel at one side. I'm sure the Kindle that looks the same (Oasis?) is too. Bigger screen would of course be nice, but price goes up quite steeply then. And I'm not sure how much of a difference an 8" really is to 7".