Do any of you have an Alexa type device?

[RiverguyVT]

http://fox17.com/news/local/does-google ... nt-says-no

[BigDave]

I have Echos in the bedroom and den. They're great - play music, tell you the weather, and basically anything.

I'm amused by the headline - "Does Google Home know who Jesus is? This man says no". Couldn't the reporter investigate for herself whether Google Home knows who Jesus is? "Is the sky blue? This man says yes."

[TheH2]

http://fox17.com/news/local/does-google ... nt-says-no

If I told you that you could put a device in your house that listens to everything you say and has very good "ears", who in their right minds would agree to that. It's baffling to me why anyone, much less millions of people would put this device in their house.

Yes, I have an Alexa.... It's great for playing music and adding stuff to my Amazon Fresh order (grocery). With that said, there is a button that mutes it which I do often.

[HokieJoe]

Mobile devices are bad enough, so no, I will not pay for a device which can, and does in some cases, listen to your conversations. They'll sell that data to other vendors and government. If not now, it will happen eventually.

I don't want 'free' devices which do that either.

[BigDave]

Mobile devices are bad enough, so no, I will not pay for a device which can, and does in some cases, listen to your conversations. They'll sell that data to other vendors and government. If not now, it will happen eventually.

I don't want 'free' devices which do that either.

They only report what you say to the government if you say "terrorism", "Allah", or "nuclear bomb".

Hey, why are all these black SUVs pulling up?

[133743Hokie]

http://fox17.com/news/local/does-google ... nt-says-no

If I told you that you could put a device in your house that listens to everything you say and has very good "ears", who in their right minds would agree to that. It's baffling to me why anyone, much less millions of people would put this device in their house.

Yes, I have an Alexa.... It's great for playing music and adding stuff to my Amazon Fresh order (grocery). With that said, there is a button that mutes it which I do often.

If it's plugged in or powered, it's listening.

[HokieJoe]

Mobile devices are bad enough, so no, I will not pay for a device which can, and does in some cases, listen to your conversations. They'll sell that data to other vendors and government. If not now, it will happen eventually.

I don't want 'free' devices which do that either.

They only report what you say to the government if you say "terrorism", "Allah", or "nuclear bomb".

Hey, why are all these black SUVs pulling up?

Don't forget the chemtrails.

[HooFighter]

I wonder if TechMom has one.

[nolanvt]

[USN_Hokie]

http://fox17.com/news/local/does-google ... nt-says-no

If I told you that you could put a device in your house that listens to everything you say and has very good "ears", who in their right minds would agree to that. It's baffling to me why anyone, much less millions of people would put this device in their house.

Yes, I have an Alexa.... It's great for playing music and adding stuff to my Amazon Fresh order (grocery). With that said, there is a button that mutes it which I do often.

If it's plugged in or powered, it's listening.

Yup. I'm starting to think the Amish have it right with their mailbox thing.

[USN_Hokie]

I wonder if TechMom has one.

What does Alexa say when you ask about the price of a caesar salad?

[Hokieman1987]

My wife and I use Alexa to settle a lot of arguments. Small mundane stuff like ages of celebrities or about history. What little info she can gather about us sticks in the mud would be completely useless to any marketer.

[BigDave]

I wonder if TechMom has one.

What does Alexa say when you ask about the price of a caesar salad?

"I'm not quite sure how to help you with that."

[BigDave]

http://fox17.com/news/local/does-google ... nt-says-no

If I told you that you could put a device in your house that listens to everything you say and has very good "ears", who in their right minds would agree to that. It's baffling to me why anyone, much less millions of people would put this device in their house.

Yes, I have an Alexa.... It's great for playing music and adding stuff to my Amazon Fresh order (grocery). With that said, there is a button that mutes it which I do often.

If it's plugged in or powered, it's listening.

If that were true, then they would have been caught.

How hard would it be for some geek who knows what they are doing (or even someone who doesn't really know what they are doing but has a nice router) to analyze the network traffic from their echo and see that it is sending way more data than it should be? A lot of routers give you nice reports of what each device is doing, what its hours are, etc.

Well, if you see that while you were watching a movie, but didn't say "Alexa" one time, it had 100 megabytes of upstream traffic, then you know it's really listening to everything that goes on around it.

If they were really uploading everything, not just when you say the wake word, then we would know about it.

[USN_Hokie]

http://fox17.com/news/local/does-google ... nt-says-no

If I told you that you could put a device in your house that listens to everything you say and has very good "ears", who in their right minds would agree to that. It's baffling to me why anyone, much less millions of people would put this device in their house.

Yes, I have an Alexa.... It's great for playing music and adding stuff to my Amazon Fresh order (grocery). With that said, there is a button that mutes it which I do often.

If it's plugged in or powered, it's listening.

If that were true, then they would have been caught.

How hard would it be for some geek who knows what they are doing (or even someone who doesn't really know what they are doing but has a nice router) to analyze the network traffic from their echo and see that it is sending way more data than it should be? A lot of routers give you nice reports of what each device is doing, what its hours are, etc.

Well, if you see that while you were watching a movie, but didn't say "Alexa" one time, it had 100 megabytes of upstream traffic, then you know it's really listening to everything that goes on around it.

If they were really uploading everything, not just when you say the wake word, then we would know about it.

I would bet money it's listening all the time. They are selling these things for less than it costs to make them - you are the real product.

Think about it though - it would be hugely inefficient to just send live recorded data 24/7. Instead, it's probably programmed based on existing or potential advertising agreements - ie, if it hears the word "pizza", you get an ad for Domino's pizza. It probably isn't (though I bet it can) sending audio either - rather a handful of 1's and 0's based on audio.

ETA:..... and I get an ad for Papa John's at the bottom of the screen as soon as I post this....

[Techmomof2]

Crazy Guy bought one. I keep it in the kitchen so she hears a lot about cooking and beer making. There's a small TV nearby so she hears a lot of sports and Fox News. After she butted into one of my conversations, I turn it off unless she's playing music.