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Huawei Snubs Google, Ships An Android Phone With Alexa (reuters.com)
Huawei announced its flagship handset will gives users access to Amazon's Alexa assistant in the U.S., suggesting a new worry for Google, according to Reuters. An anonymous reader writes:
"The adoption of Alexa by a prominent Android manufacturer indicates that Amazon may have opened up an early lead over Google as the companies race to present their digital assistants to as many people as possible, analysts said." Analyst Jan Dawson at Jackdaw Research even told Reuters that if Google's personal assistant lags in popularity when voice becomes the most popular interface, "that's a huge loss for Google in terms of data gathering, training its AI, and ultimately the ability to drive advertising revenue."
Tension may have started when Google decided to debut Google Assistant on their own Pixel smartphones. "While Google has expressed an interest in bringing its assistant to other Android smartphones, the decision to debut the feature on its own hardware may have strained relations with manufacturers, Dawson said. 'It highlights just what a strategic mistake it can be for services companies to make their own hardware and give it preferential access to new services.'"
Nvidia announced this week at CES that they'd be using Google Assistant for their Shield TVs, while Whirlpool and Ford both announced Alexa-enabled products. But this article argues Google Assistant has one thing that Alexa doesn't have: a search engine.
Tension may have started when Google decided to debut Google Assistant on their own Pixel smartphones. "While Google has expressed an interest in bringing its assistant to other Android smartphones, the decision to debut the feature on its own hardware may have strained relations with manufacturers, Dawson said. 'It highlights just what a strategic mistake it can be for services companies to make their own hardware and give it preferential access to new services.'"
Nvidia announced this week at CES that they'd be using Google Assistant for their Shield TVs, while Whirlpool and Ford both announced Alexa-enabled products. But this article argues Google Assistant has one thing that Alexa doesn't have: a search engine.
I'm still waiting for the digital "assistants" to be able to do much. I've played with them, and they are very, very basic. The number of things they can do accurately and reliably is quite small, and that's if you don't have an accent or quirks in your speech. I can't even get any of them (Siri, Alexa, Cortana) to reliably play a song that isn't from their preferred music store. They are all like that in almost all of their functions. It's a walled garden of suck.
I will give Amazon the credit that they're so far the only ones that have published a list of the things you can say to their Alexa. This is really useful support info and lets me know that it's mostly about ordering things and really basic queries like the population of a town or the conversion of quarts to ounces.
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Yes, you're crazy, because they do have access to digital assistants of their choice (not necessarily any, but certainly many). Samsung phones come with S-Voice AND Ok Google. Microsoft makes Cortana available for download. I don't think the Amazon Alexa app has voice response (it's meant to configure other Alexa devices) but there are numerous third party apps that tap into Alexa voice.Heck, my smart home app (Lowes Iris) used to have it's own voice control, although they discontinued it, mostly because it stunk.
You're confusing "any assistant I want should be pre-installed" with "I can't have any assistant I want, because it came with X instead."
since android is built on Linux and is (mostly) open source eventually google's dominance on android would meet competition sooner or later and it would take a big player with deep pockets to do it and Amazon is a player that meets those qualifications, maybe within a couple of years there will be android phones that gets system updates from Amazon, or maybe the Co-Op method of development where several hardware vendors and phone service carriers will all pitch in on the development of the OS and apps that goes in to their products
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
So what is Alexa good at except ordering unwanted doll's houses?
Free, as in your money being freed from the confines of your account.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think either Google or Amazon is providing their digital assistant to be installed on any device.
Just what I was thinking. If a phone manufacturer didn't want Google Assistant as part of the Google Play Store or the OS, then they couldn't call the OS Android and couldn't put the Play Store app on their hardware. The situation would be like Amazon's use of a somewhat crippled Android OS and it's inability to call it Android and give access to Play Store. I'm not sure it's hurt Amazon too much, though look what happened to the Fire Phone, or whatever it was called.
In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act. George Orwell
Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think either Google or Amazon is providing their digital assistant to be installed on any device.
Google Assistant can be accessed on any device via their Allo app. I think my original comment already mentioned the numerous third party apps providing Alexa to an Android or iOS device. Cortana can be downloaded. Samsung provides S-Voice on their devices. My point was, and still is, you can replace the voice recognition assistant that came with your phone.
After a year of so living with Alexa I find her to be exceptionally useful for many things, not including deep searches. For everyday things (and being Amazon, for selling things) she does a marvelous job but the AI behind Alexa is pretty much an Eliza-class AI. Google has and is in the position to continue developing better deep-thinking AI's, as does IBM.
I think Google and Amazon need to bury the hatchet, and add "Alexa, Ask Google..." to Alexa's skill set. There comes a time when a user wants a better search result than one gets with Alexa's default Bong search. A skill that would permit Alexa to consult with a better AI would be a very useful addition. In that same vein, it might be nice for Amazon to buy some IBM hardware and add "Alexa, Ask Watson..." to the universe of skills.
We're better together.
Don't take life too seriously; it isn't permanent.
Am I crazy to suggest that consumers ought to have access to any "digital assistant" they choose through any device, like they do on the web?
I think these phones are glad-hand MBA wet dreams more than they are computing machinery.
I'd like to have the choice to disable "smart features" on my TV and just let it be a TV. If I want to add smart features, I'll buy an external device and if it dies or gets bricked by Malware, I can still watch TV. If my external smart device stops getting updates and becomes a magnet for malware, I can replace it. Instead of manufacturers doing half-hearted attempts at integrating smart features, companies that specialize in those devices can make them and compete with each other with devices at various price points, so instead of LG using the cheapest possible device to save $10 on the price of the TV giving a laggy UI with few features, I can pay $100 for a faster Roku (or Google TV or Apple TV or whatever) with a more responsive UI.
I guess what I really want is an industry standard API to TV's that provides access to the tuner, remote control, etc, then I can buy a smart device from a number of manufacturers. Sort of like a Roku stick, but with tighter integration with the TV through an API so I don't need a second remote control to run it, and so the device can control TV features like changing channels, turning off the TV, etc.
I don't even care if it works with a cable-card since I've given up cable long ago -- cable companies "won" that battle, but I think they are losing the war.
Indeed. It's like making a TV with a built-in VCR or combining the base unit[1] & monitor of a computer or a stereo that looks like separates but isn't.
[1] The thing that secretaries & marketing people call the CPU. WTF *is* it called?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
At least there isn't systemd for Android. Yet.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Ideally a phone should be like a computer. It might come with a default OS/firmware, but one should be given the option to change things easily. For example, if I want a Google-free experience, I should be able to have a device loaded with Amazon's store natively, Alexa present, and so on. Or, perhaps F-droid as the store/repository of choice with no commercial presence by any companies if I so chose.
Sometimes, you can replace some things. Nova Launcher, a custom keyboard go on any new Android phone I have so I have the same UI regardless of brand. However, there are still a ton of underlying apps that shouldn't be there. Yes, one can firewall them with root access, but the ideal is to have nothing on the phone unless it is absolutely needed.
tl;dr, have a default bloatware experience the phone ships as default, but have an option to be able to load something custom and usable. If I don't want a part of the Amazon ecosystem, I throw on GApps.
While this will make the pedants crazy, it still is technically the CPU, even it it's a SoC or whatever.
In any case, inventing new descriptive words to correct a misapprehension that doesn't even matter in the first place is always the best way to go. Bonus points for making people feel stupid for not knowing your preferred nomenclature.
The most common argument against what you're proposing is the Security problem. Essentially, people are carrying around these micro-computers (teehee) and putting their entire lives on them. These same people are best assumed to be too incompetent to properly manage their own devices, because statistics show they actually are that stupid, or careless, or whatever. Thus, it beholds the companies who make these things to make them "unhackable", even at the expense of those of us who would prefer more flexibility in the system.
That is why root is practically never easily available, boot loaders are increasingly impossible to unlock and the OS's are systematically reducing the types of features that can lead to security problems.
Sure, to the unhinged it looks like a giant conspiracy to ensure that consumers are permanently locked into an ecosystem where they have no control over anything whatsoever, and can be spied upon and manipulated at will by whatever corporate interests the maker of the device has made deals with. Shortly we'll find phones being legally tied to the owner, as a form of Identity, and as such the owner will be responsible for anything the device does, even though they can exert practically no control over it in the first place. And now that Google has killed off CyanogenMod, we'll see a glorious new day where all devices are Google Approved and we can start feeding all of our day to day existence into the (increasingly powerful) AI's that power these stupid assistants, because what could possibly go wrong?? I want CyberJesus at the GOoglePlex to know everything I'm doing.
Wait, was I presenting myself as the non-unhinged party here? Shit.
That basically already exists in the HDMI spec. It's called CEC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... and it's pretty well supported in my experience. It's how a Chromecast can turn on your TV and change inputs when you connect to it. Usually the play and pause buttons on your TV or amplifier remote will pause and resume whatever is playing on the chromecast. Same with Kodi on a raspberry pi or similar device.
I would actually be surprised if there are not already items that work with Alexa that you can do that with.