6 ms·

Context: I recently left Amazon Some orgs within the company are fairly lean, some are hugely bloated. Amazon isn't homogeneous. For example, Alexa is very ove

by axg11 4y ago

Context: I recently left Amazon Some orgs within the company are fairly lean, some are hugely bloated. Amazon isn't homogeneous. For example, Alexa is very over-resourced and it's common to hear about 4+ teams working on slight variations of the same project. Lots of redundancy there. I believe Alexa as an org is losing $5b+ per year. Contrast that to all the criticism Facebook is receiving for their investment into VR/AR. The investment in Alexa was a platform play. Amazon thought that voice would be the next big platform. I'm not sure results and trajectory justify the investment anymore.

ctvo 4y ago
Unlike Facebook Alexa was somewhat successful. See Alexa microwaves, cars, TVs, etc.. It looks like Amazon also knows when to move on vs. Meta.
- axg11 4y ago
  Success is relative. Voice didn't turn out to be "the next big computing platform". It's still mostly a command interface. Perhaps it still could become something bigger. Alexa isn't widely used on the iPhone/iOS/CarPlay or Android/Android Auto, the two most important places for voice. Alexa works well but doesn't have a clear technology advantage vs Google Assistant (admittedly, Siri is trash). Contrast that to VR, which is in a much earlier stage of its technology and adoption cycle: Meta has a strong technology advantage, currently has the best overall platform and _if_ VR becomes the next big computing platform, Meta is in a strong position to capture a significant proportion of market share. It's a big if! but at least there's still a chance.
  - pm90 4y ago
    Voice still has a lot of potential, especially with the advances in AI that we've been seeing recently. A robust voice-controlled interface would be immensely useful to consumers. I think the investment in Alexa voice is well worth it compared to whatever meta is doing atm.
  - foobiekr 4y ago
    Voice as an interface sucks for almost everything where choices exist. As a purely serial communications method you are forced to wait for enumerated choices. As a primary interface voice was very widely used in the 80s and 90s in the form of IVRs and the industry was immediately destroyed by web browsers as fast as was possible. Nothing makes people angrier than having to go through a phone menu system and that’s just an organized version of your more general voice interface. “Alexa set a timer” defines the kinds of interactions that are sensible to do with voice and it is very, very narrow. It was never, ever going to be big.
- draw_down 4y ago
- NBJack 4y ago
  From what I heard, and this was years ago, it is a very resource intensive service to actually run. Given how little I have personally used my Alexa to make or inform actual purchases, I suspect it unfortunately doesnt actually earn much.
tinyhouse 4y ago
Alexa is crazy. Close to 10K employees for a product that they don't even know how to monetize. I understand that it's part of the Amazon flywheel but there's a limit of how much you can rely on AWS to fund you. Alexa is full of horrible managers that only care about growing their teams so that they can get a promo.
- bushbaba 4y ago
  Alexa is funded by retail’s profits.
  - rapsey 4y ago
    Retail has no profits. AWS is the profit center.
    - dbliss 4y ago
      and advertising
    - bushbaba 4y ago
      Retail has no profit after all expenses. One of those expenses is Alexa
      - lotsofpulp 4y ago
        What needs to be distinguished here is retail as in Amazon procuring and selling goods, or retail as in Amazon being a platform and another version of Aliexpress. The former is a low single digit profit margin business, the latter probably has a decent profit margin.
- TigeriusKirk 4y ago
  Alexa does seem like it has fantastic potential. To throw so many resources at it with so little result seems like an incredibly massive failure of management.
barbazoo 4y ago
The fact that organizations have multiple teams working on overlapping or even similar things baffles me. I can't imagine how that wouldn't be immensely dissatisfying for the individual.
- axg11 4y ago
  Internally it was sold as: working together with other teams is too inefficient due to dependencies and differing priorities. It's faster to build it again independently than integrate with the existing service.
- dsfyu404ed 4y ago
  In environments where missing deadlines can have huge cascading effects it isn't unheard of to do redundant work so that you have a better shot of meeting your deadline and in a good case you have multiple successful options to pick from. When your deadlines are potentially expensive enough (think capital investment that need to be bought in time to be built out before old ones become uneconomical to operate) this approach can be well worth it.
- lightbendover 4y ago
  Not all teams are created equal. Having multiple teams with an extremely similar charter promotes competition, harder work, and deeper search for synergies elsewhere. A single team with a guarded remit is not going to try as hard and they may outright fail on their mission even if they do have internal competition. It makes a lot of sense if you can afford it.
- shmatt 4y ago
  This approach was made popular by Steve Jobs at Apple. He would have multiple teams competing to who's solution would survive, while the other teams products were thrown away This goes all the way back to his early days (I think I remember a scene about this in The Pirates of Silicon Valley), but also reportedly multiple teams were building very different original iPhones
  - no_wizard 4y ago
andsoitis 4y ago
> Amazon thought that voice would be the next big platform It turns out that there are many interaction models where Voice is clearly inferior. Visual discovery (contrast with music) such as for videos, as well as navigation in a UI, are poorly done via voice.
criddell 4y ago
I have an Echo and a Homepod and I rarely use the Echo anymore because of their "by the way, did you know..." responses. They know there are a lot of users who want to disable that but unfortunately their goals aren't aligned with their users' goals.
- nickm12 4y ago
  You can say "Alexa, stop by the way" and it will disable it for a time, but it will come back. If you really want to disable it for good, you can set up a routine to effectively issue this "snooze" on by the way at some interval.
- cableshaft 4y ago
  Everything I use Alexa for: "Alexa, set a timer for x mins / wake me up at x time." "Alexa, what's the weather today?" "Alexa, can dogs eat <type of food>?" "Alexa, play <the song I just referenced so my wife knows the reference even though she doesn't care>" Mostly just the first two. I don't care about anything else they try to push on me.
- odysseus 4y ago
  I got rid of my Echo mostly because of those types of responses. And also for how easy they make it for you to buy something accidentally off Amazon, or accidentally upgrade to Music Unlimited.

by axg11 4y ago

ctvo 4y ago

Unlike Facebook Alexa was somewhat successful. See Alexa microwaves, cars, TVs, etc.. It looks like Amazon also knows when to move on vs. Meta.

axg11 4y ago
Success is relative. Voice didn't turn out to be "the next big computing platform". It's still mostly a command interface. Perhaps it still could become something bigger. Alexa isn't widely used on the iPhone/iOS/CarPlay or Android/Android Auto, the two most important places for voice. Alexa works well but doesn't have a clear technology advantage vs Google Assistant (admittedly, Siri is trash). Contrast that to VR, which is in a much earlier stage of its technology and adoption cycle: Meta has a strong technology advantage, currently has the best overall platform and _if_ VR becomes the next big computing platform, Meta is in a strong position to capture a significant proportion of market share. It's a big if! but at least there's still a chance.
- pm90 4y ago
  Voice still has a lot of potential, especially with the advances in AI that we've been seeing recently. A robust voice-controlled interface would be immensely useful to consumers. I think the investment in Alexa voice is well worth it compared to whatever meta is doing atm.
- foobiekr 4y ago
  Voice as an interface sucks for almost everything where choices exist. As a purely serial communications method you are forced to wait for enumerated choices. As a primary interface voice was very widely used in the 80s and 90s in the form of IVRs and the industry was immediately destroyed by web browsers as fast as was possible. Nothing makes people angrier than having to go through a phone menu system and that’s just an organized version of your more general voice interface. “Alexa set a timer” defines the kinds of interactions that are sensible to do with voice and it is very, very narrow. It was never, ever going to be big.
draw_down 4y ago
NBJack 4y ago
From what I heard, and this was years ago, it is a very resource intensive service to actually run. Given how little I have personally used my Alexa to make or inform actual purchases, I suspect it unfortunately doesnt actually earn much.

tinyhouse 4y ago

Alexa is crazy. Close to 10K employees for a product that they don't even know how to monetize. I understand that it's part of the Amazon flywheel but there's a limit of how much you can rely on AWS to fund you. Alexa is full of horrible managers that only care about growing their teams so that they can get a promo.

bushbaba 4y ago
Alexa is funded by retail’s profits.
- rapsey 4y ago
  Retail has no profits. AWS is the profit center.
  - dbliss 4y ago
    and advertising
  - bushbaba 4y ago
    Retail has no profit after all expenses. One of those expenses is Alexa
    - lotsofpulp 4y ago
      What needs to be distinguished here is retail as in Amazon procuring and selling goods, or retail as in Amazon being a platform and another version of Aliexpress. The former is a low single digit profit margin business, the latter probably has a decent profit margin.
TigeriusKirk 4y ago
Alexa does seem like it has fantastic potential. To throw so many resources at it with so little result seems like an incredibly massive failure of management.

barbazoo 4y ago

The fact that organizations have multiple teams working on overlapping or even similar things baffles me. I can't imagine how that wouldn't be immensely dissatisfying for the individual.

axg11 4y ago
Internally it was sold as: working together with other teams is too inefficient due to dependencies and differing priorities. It's faster to build it again independently than integrate with the existing service.
dsfyu404ed 4y ago
In environments where missing deadlines can have huge cascading effects it isn't unheard of to do redundant work so that you have a better shot of meeting your deadline and in a good case you have multiple successful options to pick from. When your deadlines are potentially expensive enough (think capital investment that need to be bought in time to be built out before old ones become uneconomical to operate) this approach can be well worth it.
lightbendover 4y ago
Not all teams are created equal. Having multiple teams with an extremely similar charter promotes competition, harder work, and deeper search for synergies elsewhere. A single team with a guarded remit is not going to try as hard and they may outright fail on their mission even if they do have internal competition. It makes a lot of sense if you can afford it.
shmatt 4y ago
This approach was made popular by Steve Jobs at Apple. He would have multiple teams competing to who's solution would survive, while the other teams products were thrown away This goes all the way back to his early days (I think I remember a scene about this in The Pirates of Silicon Valley), but also reportedly multiple teams were building very different original iPhones
- no_wizard 4y ago

andsoitis 4y ago

> Amazon thought that voice would be the next big platform It turns out that there are many interaction models where Voice is clearly inferior. Visual discovery (contrast with music) such as for videos, as well as navigation in a UI, are poorly done via voice.

criddell 4y ago

I have an Echo and a Homepod and I rarely use the Echo anymore because of their "by the way, did you know..." responses. They know there are a lot of users who want to disable that but unfortunately their goals aren't aligned with their users' goals.

nickm12 4y ago
You can say "Alexa, stop by the way" and it will disable it for a time, but it will come back. If you really want to disable it for good, you can set up a routine to effectively issue this "snooze" on by the way at some interval.
cableshaft 4y ago
Everything I use Alexa for: "Alexa, set a timer for x mins / wake me up at x time." "Alexa, what's the weather today?" "Alexa, can dogs eat <type of food>?" "Alexa, play <the song I just referenced so my wife knows the reference even though she doesn't care>" Mostly just the first two. I don't care about anything else they try to push on me.
odysseus 4y ago
I got rid of my Echo mostly because of those types of responses. And also for how easy they make it for you to buy something accidentally off Amazon, or accidentally upgrade to Music Unlimited.