Thinking from smart speakers, what is "really smart"

Amazon Echo Series

According to a report by Bloomberg at the end of 2021, 15% to 25% of Amazon Echo users stopped using the device after two weeks. Echo Studio, which the author uses as a stereo pair. It's interesting how the numbers are interpreted here. People continue to use it, so I feel that this is a pretty amazing number. In fact, with any device, it takes about two weeks to decide whether to continue using it or not. Although I bought it with high hopes for my house, there are a lot of devices that I rarely use, but I think most households are like that.　Compared to other general home appliances, smart speakers like Amazon Echo seem to have a large gap between the expected value and the effective value. Expectations were certainly high for what could be done by interacting with AI through voice commands. However, in order to enrich our lives with voice commands, it is necessary to purchase various Alexa-enabled devices, which entails enormous costs and troublesome settings. Without it, you can't turn off a single bathroom light. However, the Amazon Echo was originally designed to work with such an ecosystem. In other words, buy bang bang compatible devices on Amazon, that's the goal. There is a limit to whether it can be used conveniently by just taking out the Echo, which is the controller terminal, without doing that. So many people settle for something like a kitchen timer, asking for the weather forecast, or playing music at best.

Why are they no longer used?

　It wasn't that long ago that smart speakers began to gain widespread recognition. It became widely known in the United States around 2016, but Amazon Echo first landed in Japan at the end of March 2018. I witnessed the expansion of the smart speaker market at CES in January 2017, but I remember wondering if I would use it even if I came to Japan. I felt that Japanese people are not suited to the act of commanding people to do something by voice. At the time, I thought the reason for this was the difference in the "causative culture". In the United States, it is common practice to use small change to motivate people to do something. If you go to a hotel, you pay the doorboy or maid a tip, have the kids clean the garden and give you pocket money, hire a neighbor's daughter to babysit and go out to dinner with your husband. Even in ordinary households, many people are accustomed to using words to move people, and the voice commands of smart speakers may strongly reflect that culture. I thought. However, when I actually started using smart speakers myself, I feel like I was taking things a little too seriously. More simply, isn't this the difference in how troublesome it is? For example, even if you turn off the lights in the room, it's troublesome to go all the way to the switch in the US because the house is so big → the remote control is kind of far away → it's troublesome → but if you use your voice, it will reach you wherever you are → the voice is the best! "Isn't this the trend?" On the other hand, in Japan, the rooms are small, so you can walk two or three steps to the switch on the wall, and the remote control is lying within reach. They are trained to take care of themselves. You don't even have to tell someone to do it by voice. Also, personally, I love to flip the switch, and I can't understand the contradiction that the switch is on but the light is off. It's much more troublesome to turn off the switch once and turn it on again to turn on the light again. On the other hand, when my hands are dirty with cooking, I have no choice but to rely on the voice to set the alarm for boiled and fried food. Even if you say that you only use a timer, there is no other device that can set a timer by voice, so it can not be helped. "But that alone probably doesn't add up to the cost." At most, you can't get 5000 to 7000 yen with just that. However, if a clock that lets you hear the weather by voice and set a timer is sold for 2,000 to 3,000 yen, you might accidentally buy it. If you look at Mercari and Yahoo! Isn't that enough?