By Geoffrey A. Fowler
Amazon.com Inc. is masterful at changing our habits. Not long
ago, it seemed unthinkable to buy clothes online. Or buy anything
on your phone. Or talk to a speaker (also, mind you, a way to buy
things).
The $230 Echo Show is Amazon's most audacious product yet. Now
it wants to colonize your countertop with a 7-inch touch screen and
a camera. You can even use it to randomly peer through the
always-on camera of loved ones' Shows and into their homes, if they
list you as persona grata.
Amazon is onto a good idea: the casual kitchen computer that
doesn't require a mouse, keyboard or even meatloaf-kneading fingers
to operate. But there is still work ahead to make the Show a
welcome addition to most homes. This first version has limited
skills that take advantage of the new screen -- yet it is so
intrusive, I was ready to yank the plug after a week.
The Show, which ships Wednesday, has all the functions of
Amazon's original Echo speaker, the first home appliance to
popularize internet-connected microphones. You call out the wake
word "Alexa," then command Amazon's AI assistant to play Beyoncé,
turn on the lights or tell a joke. The Show's boxy design and wide
bezels aren't as cool as the cylindrical Echo. But it could hear me
just as well as the original, and its speaker sounded slightly
better (but still not great).
In some important ways, the Show is unlike anything we've seen
before, whether the original Echo or its competitors Google Home
and Apple HomePod. The Show is part phone booth, part hands-free
tablet, part countertop TV.
So what can the Show show? In its first week, the screen
"skills" -- Alexa's term for apps -- are limited and not
particularly novel but suggest where things are headed:
-- It's a senior-friendly video-call station to use with people
who also have a Show or the Alexa smartphone app.
-- It can pull up recipes or scan items to buy from
Amazon.com.
-- It plays Amazon and YouTube videos. (There are no TV channels
yet, but "Jeopardy" live streams surely can't be far off.)
-- It shows lyrics while playing music, prompting spontaneous
singalongs.
I wouldn't bet against the Show getting more screen skills fast:
Amazon has proven far more successful at lining up partners for
Alexa than either Apple Inc. or Alphabet Inc.'s Google have for
their talking assistants. One of the Show's first partnerships
pairs it with the Ring video doorbell, one of my favorite
smart-home devices. Just say, "Alexa, show me the front door."
It'll also work with cameras from Nest, August and others.
As a gadget pioneer, I'm willing to wait for more skills. My
problem is more fundamental: Living with a Show is too often
perturbing -- and occasionally creepy.
The first time I turned the Show on, the screen asked me if I'd
like to subscribe to Amazon's Audible service. I couldn't proceed
until I'd replied. ("No.") It was my first reminder that the Echo
Show is as much an Amazon sales kiosk as a kitchen helper.
Once up and running, the Show started flashing a series of
calendar events, headlines and usage tips. One read: "Video:
Baseball Mascot Outruns Fan. Try 'Alexa, play the mascot video.' "
That's one way to teach owners about Alexa's ever-growing
capabilities. I assumed the tips would eventually fade.
But they didn't. They keep refreshing every seven seconds. In
the span of one minute, the Show nagged me to play Katy Perry and
told me about a Batman-costumed policeman. It felt like one of
those elevator displays took up residence next to my toaster.
Voice-only Alexa was well-bred enough to speak only when spoken
to.
This much is a relief: An Amazon spokeswoman tells me the
company has "no plans or future intentions to advertise products on
Echo Show."
Eventually I found some settings that let me remove the
"trending topics" messages, but not the tips. A Do Not Disturb mode
stops incoming calls and dims the screen. Using another setting,
for the clock, you can turn off the screen completely in Do Not
Disturb mode, until you call Alexa. This should be the default, not
hidden in settings.
Bringing home an always-on screen can disrupt family life in
other ways. For one, it's catnip for children. Unlike a regular TV,
they can operate it whenever they want, without a remote. It's cute
when tykes ask Alexa for songs, weather and information but grating
when they beg for videos. Now that Alexa can do so much, it's
urgent for her to gain the ability to recognize the voices -- or
faces -- of different family members.
The Show is fingerprint-prone, too. You'd think a device that
begs to sit on a kitchen counter would be oil-resistant, or easier
to clean.
The biggest head scratcher is that 5-megapixel camera. True,
Amazon got millions of us to live with microphones, but cameras are
a different beast.
One of the Show's headline features requires a very high level
of comfort with being watched: "Drop in" mode lets approved friends
turn on your camera and say hi, without requiring you to pick up
the call. The nominal privacy protection is a 10-second countdown,
in which the view into Lord-knows-what happening in your house is
obscured by digital frosting. During that time, you can disable the
camera or reject the call.
That function is optional, but another one isn't: To figure out
when to activate the screen, the camera remains on, watching for
people in the room. Amazon says it isn't storing or sending that
video over the internet, yet it feels like a needless risk, since
so few functions actually require the camera. You can cut off the
camera with Do Not Disturb or with the same button that cuts off
the Show's microphone -- but using the button means the whole thing
stops working.
Another new Amazon product, the $200 invitation-only Echo Look,
is designed first and foremost as a camera. It will doubtless come
with similar baggage, if not more.
I understand that Amazon is doing everything in its power to
keep the Show from becoming a portal for hackers. It is certainly
way safer than the cheap baby monitors and security cams that have
fallen to malware. But it's unfortunate the Show isn't compatible
with the oldest safety trick of all: You can't just put tape over
the camera and take it off as needed. If you try that on the Echo
Show, it gets confused, dims the screen and becomes unusable.
The Show is a promising talking home computer and may appeal to
people already heavily invested in Alexa's world. But it's a shame
Amazon's strange design choices muddy its potential. Walking the
line between futuristic and creepy, the Show landed in the worst
place of all: annoying.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
June 28, 2017 10:47 ET (14:47 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2017 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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