Stupid Question - Amazon Echo/Alexa

[Mister Rog]

Thinking of getting SWMBO one for Crimbles. Are any subscriptions or whatever required ? Any ongoing costs once the unit has been bought ?

I looked but not seen anything, but hey this is Amazon, there may well be something hidden there   

[TheBoy]

Isn't there something about extra modules that you need to unlock? Not sure if this costs, or you need to use it lots to unlock (remember, your habits are valuable to Amazon (and Google and everyone else selling such devices)).

A vaguely recall a discussion down the pub with Terry the Chipman about his.  But as it wasn't my turn to drive, its a bit hazy

[Viral_Jim]

As always it depends what you want to do with it, there are lots of things they can do (growing daily) - a few suggestions with comments:

Play your MP3s/other digital music
To do this, you upload them onto an online space that Amazon gives you. There are tiers of storage, starting at free and going up depending on how much storage you need. But, unless you are serious audiophiles, chances are the free space will be enough.

play radio stations for you
Much like BBC iPlayer Radio app for the phone. This is free for all the radio stations I've tried. There may be some you pay for though. 

order stuff from amazon
No cost as such, obviously you have to pay for what you order, and if you want to use Amazon prime delivery, this carries a cost.

play music from Amazon's own music library
This is like Spotify and similar services. It's a bit like when you upload your music, except that you have access to millions of tracks Amazon already have. Cost is £10pcm. However, it's worth checking if you have mini me's or other family that there isn't already a subscription somewhere as you can upgrade to a family plan for an additional £5pcm.

set alarms, ask about the weather etc etc
Free, other than electricity costs

home automation
Beyond the scope of most users, but generally the software is free (a platform/methodology called IFTTT is often used to get different bits to talk to one another), but obviously you have to buy the hardware.

Hope that's a reasonable starter for you

[Mister Rog]

To be honest, it's just to give her something to talk to instead of me I

P

[STEMO]

You can get it to turn the lights on and off, control your heating....all sorts. But then you have to connect insecure light bulbs and stuff (IOT) to the www, all of which have default passwords of 123 or ABC. 

[Doctor Gollum]

Alexa, turn off the internet... er I meant the outside light... Alexa? Alexa? Anyone? Oh cock

[tigers_gonads]

Setup instructions here 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0XTaOmNqlF0

[Mister Rog]

Setup instructions here 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0XTaOmNqlF0

It's ordered. This is not far off what I'm expecting. SWMBO is technophobic at the best of times. Loves the idea of tech, but not prepared to put in any effort. Hey ! It's a present. Better than saying Oooooh I forgot   

[Kevin Wood]

Alexa, turn off the internet... er I meant the outside light... Alexa? Alexa? Anyone? Oh cock

Yeah, a mate of mine was really smug about his voice controlled house. Until his internet connection went down for a week or so and his house stopped working.

Gotta love the cloud.

[TheBoy]

Given the recent episodes at AWS and Azure - probably the 2 biggest - I'd want a non-cloud fallback system

[dave the builder]

Given the recent episodes at AWS and Azure - probably the 2 biggest - I'd want a non-cloud fallback system

I have that fitted (at great expense  )

"Alexa Mrs Builder.... turn on the BIG light"

[aaronjb]

You can get it to turn the lights on and off, control your heating....all sorts. But then you have to connect insecure light bulbs and stuff (IOT) to the www, all of which have default passwords of 123 or ABC. 

Top 100 insecure passwords list from the recent(ish) breaches. At number 1: 123456.
New at number 23 was "donald"

[Lagondanet]

and how does Sonos compare with the Amazon product?

[Gaffers]

You can get it to turn the lights on and off, control your heating....all sorts. But then you have to connect insecure light bulbs and stuff (IOT) to the www, all of which have default passwords of 123 or ABC. 

Depends on how/what you connect for that to be an accurate statement.  I use Z-wave products which do not have a default password, nor an IP address, but the controller is on a raspberry pi.  Z-wave are only vulnerable during the few seconds of the pairing process and even then it is very difficult to exploit and not all z-wave products are exploitable. 

I have a second raspberry pi which is connected to a number of sensors around the house on the windows and doors, PIR, CCTV, etc.  When the house alarm is set and one of the sensors is triggered my phone goes off, when the alarm is not set the lights follow you around the house.  We have a of couple of Alexas around the house which are connected to the z-wave and the speaking smart home works ok, not brilliant yet but it is improving.  I am building a new alexa for the bathroom with another raspberry pi, this is pretty easy and cheap.  All the smart home raspberry Pi and Echo traffic is filtered so none of it can be used for nefarious activities even if a hacker pwns one of them.  The whole network at home is monitored with the Security Onion.

An Arduino monitors the garden moisture level and waters it for me in the summer.

I have just bought a Ring and I am looking to make my own Echo Show for it and I am building a smart mirror.

[STEMO]

You can get it to turn the lights on and off, control your heating....all sorts. But then you have to connect insecure light bulbs and stuff (IOT) to the www, all of which have default passwords of 123 or ABC. 

Depends on how/what you connect for that to be an accurate statement.  I use Z-wave products which do not have a default password, nor an IP address, but the controller is on a raspberry pi.  Z-wave are only vulnerable during the few seconds of the pairing process and even then it is very difficult to exploit and not all z-wave products are exploitable. 

I have a second raspberry pi which is connected to a number of sensors around the house on the windows and doors, PIR, CCTV, etc.  When the house alarm is set and one of the sensors is triggered my phone goes off, when the alarm is not set the lights follow you around the house.  We have a of couple of Alexas around the house which are connected to the z-wave and the speaking smart home works ok, not brilliant yet but it is improving.  I am building a new alexa for the bathroom with another raspberry pi, this is pretty easy and cheap.  All the smart home raspberry Pi and Echo traffic is filtered so none of it can be used for nefarious activities even if a hacker pwns one of them.  The whole network at home is monitored with the Security Onion.

An Arduino monitors the garden moisture level and waters it for me in the summer.

I have just bought a Ring and I am looking to make my own Echo Show for it and I am building a smart mirror.

That's all very well, but I think Rog is more likely to be into apple crumble than raspberry pi.