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Nearly Half of American Households Will Own a Smart Speaker by 2019, Study Says (fortune.com)

Posted by msmash on from the flooding-the-market dept.

Almost half of American households will have a smart speaker by next year, according to a new study from Adobe. From a report: The study, released Monday, finds that 32% of the country already owns a smart speaker and another 16% plan on getting one this holiday season. And just as importantly, people are using those speakers. "Technology trends come and go, but we think voice is here to stay," said Colin Morris, director of product management for Adobe Analytics, in a statement. "Consumers continue to embrace voice as a means to engage their devices and the Internet. It's a trend that has fundamentally changed the face of computing." A notable indicator of the growing popularity of the speakers is how comfortable people are talking to the device in front of others. And that number is on the rise: 72% of smart speaker owners say they use voice assistants in front of others. (Only 29% of people without a smart speaker are comfortable with doing so.) Further reading: Google Home Outships Amazon Echo for Second Quarter in Row.

4 of 220 comments (clear)

  1. Seriously? by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Seriously? That many people want an ever-listening microphone in their home?That was fast.

    1. Re:Seriously? by cayenne8 · · Score: 4, Interesting
      I too agree on the privacy issues ya'll have raised here, but I in general, just fscking HATE talking to a machine/computer in general.

      I cannot STAND places that have switched to phone support that tries to get you to speak to answer questions rather than hitting a number to make choices on how they want to direct your call.

      This is especially a PITA when you're sitting in cubeville making a call....whether a direct work support call, or maybe you're on break, and calling local utilities for instance.

      I don't want co-workers around me to hear my personal business, etc.

      I have read, that some of these robo-support systems listen for hostility and curse words....I use this possibility to the fullest when calling from home and continually yell "Get me a FUCKING live operator"....after about 2-3 of those, I get to a person.

      I'm very calm and gracious when talking to people on the phone, but I cannot stand having to talk to a fucking computer...I'd almost rather talk to a foreigner with too thick of an accent to understand than a flawless English speaking computer, I hate it that much....

      --
      Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
    2. Re:Seriously? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Interesting

      you do have full control over what you are using your phone for and by extension what data is being sent out to nefarious companies.

      No you don't. If you monitor your phone's packets, you may be surprised what data is being sent where.

      Then try monitoring the packets from Alexa. Unless you say the keyword, you will see ... nothing.

      Bottom line:
      1. There is no evidence that Alexa is "spying", or doing anything except listing for a particular keyword.
      2. There is plenty of evidence that your cellphone is doing stuff behind your back and running 3rd party software.

      If you trust your cellphone more than you trust Alexa, you are a deluded fool.

  2. Re:Maybe I'm getting old.... by Miamicanes · · Score: 5, Interesting

    What, you don't enjoy listening to music with lossy compression in glorious MONAURAL?

    I really think the mid-90s were the high water mark for music reproduction... CDs had become the norm, everyone had AT LEAST a respectable pair of bookshelf-sized speakers paired with a subwoofer big enough to do 80-100hz properly, and an amp with 50W (RMS) per channel was the baseline norm. Then came mp3, iPods, and the Loudness War, and everything totally went to shit. We're literally back at the point where music doesn't sound much better than a 1960s large FM table radio did. And that really sucks.

    Surround sound with 96khz 24-bit audio was supposed to be the NORM by now. And it probably would have been, if the music industry and consumer electronics industries hadn't fucked up SACD so completely and thoroughly with DRM.... then given in to the Loudness Wars to make CDs sound even worse than low-bitrate MP3s thanks to clipping (CLIPPING, for fuck's sake!)