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> But we have two Echo devices in our household and the data shows whether a request came from the Echo Plus in the kitchen or the original Echo on our daughter

> But we have two Echo devices in our household and the data shows whether a request came from the Echo Plus in the kitchen or the original Echo on our daughter Coco’s bedside table, where it has sat since around her ninth birthday. [...] So I now know that it was Coco who wanted to know what it is to be omnisexual and what omniscient means. Doesn't it feel wrong to the author to snoop through that private information? And publishing it in a news article definitely crosses a line.

thrance 1y ago
I mean, so is committing every sound ever heard through that microphone to a database used to train a voodoo doll of their daughter to better guess what she might be able to buy next.
- jxjnskkzxxhx 1y ago
  Oh shit.... I never realized until now that's exactly what the point of Alexa is. I thought the point was like a different UI to Amazon. As in "being able to buy by clicking OR sounding must lead to a strictly larger number of sales than being able to buy by clicking only". So you can imagine my confusion on people telling me that Alexa isn't a good UI. Of course. The point is to snoop on people to make better "recommendations". Dystopian.
  - techjamie 1y ago
    It can be both. Saying "Alexa, buy eggs" is a lot quicker and easier than loading up Amazon, finding the eggs you like which will probably be the top result for you, and clicking buy (or even Buy Now). Instead, it already knows your preferences in eggs anyway, so just by telling it, you can impulsively buy the eggs without even stopping what you're doing. Then they get all that juicy "accidental activation" data on top of that.
    - daveguy 1y ago
      If only Alexa could be trusted to buy something as seemingly simple as eggs.
    - HPsquared 1y ago
      You'd just get eggs from whoever sponsored the term "eggs" the highest.
    - kbelder 1y ago
      People buy eggs off Amazon? Every now and then the modern world boggles my mind.
      - techjamie 1y ago
        I don't think so, but I needed something as an example and it was the first thing that came to mind. Also the idea of someone impulse buying eggs is amusing to me.
      - vitus 1y ago
        Why not? Amazon owns Whole Foods, and Amazon Fresh has existed for almost 20 years now. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07GBM7TZJ https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07GBM7TZJ seems like a totally normal price to pay for eggs these days, although you probably wouldn't just buy a dozen eggs in isolation, given delivery fees and driver tip.
  - Flemlo 1y ago
    That's not necessarily true. Amazon is also a ecosystem. Alexa shows you notifications from Amazon like the status of a delivery. It's able to call others (great for family). Amazon has also the fire kid tablet, fire TV etc. And if I already use Amazon anyway I'm quite happy if Amazon would recommend me good products I like. For plenty of things, Alexa is a very good UI.
    - wormius 1y ago
      "But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother."
      - Flemlo 1y ago
        It's easier to do things/ manipulate big brother when you are part of it. No one needs to know what else you do. It's a lot more suspicious to not tell big brother what he wants to hear. And besides that strategy, dystopian stories sell better. No one would read good feel descriptions.
  - cluckindan 1y ago
    I thought this was obvious from the name. The phonetics of ”Alexa” are very close to sentences such as ”I like” and ”he/she likes”.
tocs3 1y ago
Doesn't it feel wrong to the author to snoop through that private information? It feels a little strange at first but I suspect (correctly or not) that he has sought and received permission from the daughter first. Although I did not see any direct statement. The daughter is 18 or so now (maybe, adding up the times). The article is as much about the humdrumness of family life as about what Alexa and Amazon hears. I am glad I read it. Puts life (and some parts of technology in perspective).
- Ylpertnodi 1y ago
  >It feels a little strange at first but I suspect (correctly or not) that he has sought and received permission from the daughter first. .
- rendaw 1y ago
  Why would you suspect that, and what does the daughter being 18 now have to do with it?
pessimizer 1y ago
That private information is currently in the possession of an online bookstore, and he is her father.
- dotancohen 1y ago
  Next time I need a facade for a society-wide surveillance system, bookstore it will be.
  - daveguy 1y ago
    Bezos thanks you for your acknowledgement and service.
  - cluckindan 1y ago
    Out of curiosity, what was it last time?
    - dotancohen 1y ago
      Web search, webmail, and mobile OS.
dotancohen 1y ago
[flagged]
- dingnuts 1y ago
  There are a million places she could have overheard it. Our society is having a long conflict over sexual identities and the word may have come from any number of sources. > What is this marketing, why is it happening, and is it widely accepted in that society? What?
- add-sub-mul-div 1y ago
  What you're missing is that people with a sexuality (or some other identity) different from yours exist in the world and don't need to hide themselves. Your discomfort or offense makes you think that someone encountering a word means that it was "marketed" to them as opposed to that concept simply existing in society, where others will encounter it. Because identities other than yours can exist equally openly to yours. Without their acceptance needing to be justified to you. The piece of the puzzle you're missing is that a child understanding what homosexuality is (for example) is equally mundane as their learning what heterosexuality is. The world is not going back to these other identities hiding themselves, so you can either accept it or spend the rest of your life uncomfortable about it. You have free will.
daveguy 1y ago
Two questions, 1) What sensitive information was published in this article besides some superficial listening preferences and some Alexa interactions we have all had? I'm not sure identifying the extent of the use of the prefix "omni" is particularly sensitive information. It's not like anyone was divulging personal preference by asking for definitions. 2) What makes you think the author didn't run it by their family before submitting the story?
- garbagewoman 1y ago
  To answer 2, a lack of any reference to permission being sought is the obvious answer
johnea 1y ago
> Doesn't it feel wrong to the author to snoop through that private information? And publishing it in a news article definitely crosses a line. Well of course, only Amazon should have this info 8-/ This whole thing is truly disturbing. And the millennial expectation that "OF COURSE the monopolistic corps should know everything", is by far the most disturbing part of all. When in the next decade or two, people find themselves truly and irreversibly f_cked by corporate over-dominance, it will largely be their own fault...
- MegaButts 1y ago
  > And the millennial expectation that "OF COURSE the monopolistic corps should know everything", is by far the most disturbing part of all. Your experiences are very different from my own. I struggle to remember meeting anyone that thought this. Mostly people are just apathetic.
  - mschuster91 1y ago
    > Mostly people are just apathetic. And apathy is what caused all of history's greatest crimes to happen. No matter which political ideology, which skin color, which age. As for the argument of "OF COURSE the monopolistic corps should know everything" itself... I kinda get it. Google at least used to provide a decent service to the end users in exchange for all the data, but they've gone completely off the rails the last few years.
    - MegaButts 1y ago
      > Google at least used to provide a decent service to the end users in exchange for all the data, but they've gone completely off the rails the last few years. Ever since Google fucked up social media by requiring verification with Google+ they've been pretty bad. That was 14 years ago.
    - BlarfMcFlarf 1y ago
      All the tech solutions have failed. Who do I vote for to stop it?

thrance 1y ago

I mean, so is committing every sound ever heard through that microphone to a database used to train a voodoo doll of their daughter to better guess what she might be able to buy next.

jxjnskkzxxhx 1y ago
Oh shit.... I never realized until now that's exactly what the point of Alexa is. I thought the point was like a different UI to Amazon. As in "being able to buy by clicking OR sounding must lead to a strictly larger number of sales than being able to buy by clicking only". So you can imagine my confusion on people telling me that Alexa isn't a good UI. Of course. The point is to snoop on people to make better "recommendations". Dystopian.
- techjamie 1y ago
  It can be both. Saying "Alexa, buy eggs" is a lot quicker and easier than loading up Amazon, finding the eggs you like which will probably be the top result for you, and clicking buy (or even Buy Now). Instead, it already knows your preferences in eggs anyway, so just by telling it, you can impulsively buy the eggs without even stopping what you're doing. Then they get all that juicy "accidental activation" data on top of that.
  - daveguy 1y ago
    If only Alexa could be trusted to buy something as seemingly simple as eggs.
  - HPsquared 1y ago
    You'd just get eggs from whoever sponsored the term "eggs" the highest.
  - kbelder 1y ago
    People buy eggs off Amazon? Every now and then the modern world boggles my mind.
    - techjamie 1y ago
      I don't think so, but I needed something as an example and it was the first thing that came to mind. Also the idea of someone impulse buying eggs is amusing to me.
    - vitus 1y ago
      Why not? Amazon owns Whole Foods, and Amazon Fresh has existed for almost 20 years now. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07GBM7TZJ https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07GBM7TZJ seems like a totally normal price to pay for eggs these days, although you probably wouldn't just buy a dozen eggs in isolation, given delivery fees and driver tip.
- Flemlo 1y ago
  That's not necessarily true. Amazon is also a ecosystem. Alexa shows you notifications from Amazon like the status of a delivery. It's able to call others (great for family). Amazon has also the fire kid tablet, fire TV etc. And if I already use Amazon anyway I'm quite happy if Amazon would recommend me good products I like. For plenty of things, Alexa is a very good UI.
  - wormius 1y ago
    "But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother."
    - Flemlo 1y ago
      It's easier to do things/ manipulate big brother when you are part of it. No one needs to know what else you do. It's a lot more suspicious to not tell big brother what he wants to hear. And besides that strategy, dystopian stories sell better. No one would read good feel descriptions.
- cluckindan 1y ago
  I thought this was obvious from the name. The phonetics of ”Alexa” are very close to sentences such as ”I like” and ”he/she likes”.

tocs3 1y ago

Doesn't it feel wrong to the author to snoop through that private information? It feels a little strange at first but I suspect (correctly or not) that he has sought and received permission from the daughter first. Although I did not see any direct statement. The daughter is 18 or so now (maybe, adding up the times). The article is as much about the humdrumness of family life as about what Alexa and Amazon hears. I am glad I read it. Puts life (and some parts of technology in perspective).

Ylpertnodi 1y ago
>It feels a little strange at first but I suspect (correctly or not) that he has sought and received permission from the daughter first. .
rendaw 1y ago
Why would you suspect that, and what does the daughter being 18 now have to do with it?

pessimizer 1y ago

That private information is currently in the possession of an online bookstore, and he is her father.

dotancohen 1y ago
Next time I need a facade for a society-wide surveillance system, bookstore it will be.
- daveguy 1y ago
  Bezos thanks you for your acknowledgement and service.
- cluckindan 1y ago
  Out of curiosity, what was it last time?
  - dotancohen 1y ago
    Web search, webmail, and mobile OS.

dotancohen 1y ago

[flagged]

dingnuts 1y ago
There are a million places she could have overheard it. Our society is having a long conflict over sexual identities and the word may have come from any number of sources. > What is this marketing, why is it happening, and is it widely accepted in that society? What?
add-sub-mul-div 1y ago
What you're missing is that people with a sexuality (or some other identity) different from yours exist in the world and don't need to hide themselves. Your discomfort or offense makes you think that someone encountering a word means that it was "marketed" to them as opposed to that concept simply existing in society, where others will encounter it. Because identities other than yours can exist equally openly to yours. Without their acceptance needing to be justified to you. The piece of the puzzle you're missing is that a child understanding what homosexuality is (for example) is equally mundane as their learning what heterosexuality is. The world is not going back to these other identities hiding themselves, so you can either accept it or spend the rest of your life uncomfortable about it. You have free will.

daveguy 1y ago

Two questions, 1) What sensitive information was published in this article besides some superficial listening preferences and some Alexa interactions we have all had? I'm not sure identifying the extent of the use of the prefix "omni" is particularly sensitive information. It's not like anyone was divulging personal preference by asking for definitions. 2) What makes you think the author didn't run it by their family before submitting the story?

garbagewoman 1y ago
To answer 2, a lack of any reference to permission being sought is the obvious answer

johnea 1y ago

> Doesn't it feel wrong to the author to snoop through that private information? And publishing it in a news article definitely crosses a line. Well of course, only Amazon should have this info 8-/ This whole thing is truly disturbing. And the millennial expectation that "OF COURSE the monopolistic corps should know everything", is by far the most disturbing part of all. When in the next decade or two, people find themselves truly and irreversibly f_cked by corporate over-dominance, it will largely be their own fault...

MegaButts 1y ago
> And the millennial expectation that "OF COURSE the monopolistic corps should know everything", is by far the most disturbing part of all. Your experiences are very different from my own. I struggle to remember meeting anyone that thought this. Mostly people are just apathetic.
- mschuster91 1y ago
  > Mostly people are just apathetic. And apathy is what caused all of history's greatest crimes to happen. No matter which political ideology, which skin color, which age. As for the argument of "OF COURSE the monopolistic corps should know everything" itself... I kinda get it. Google at least used to provide a decent service to the end users in exchange for all the data, but they've gone completely off the rails the last few years.
  - MegaButts 1y ago
    > Google at least used to provide a decent service to the end users in exchange for all the data, but they've gone completely off the rails the last few years. Ever since Google fucked up social media by requiring verification with Google+ they've been pretty bad. That was 14 years ago.
  - BlarfMcFlarf 1y ago
    All the tech solutions have failed. Who do I vote for to stop it?