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Podcast: Alexa’s drama and our holiday gift guide

November 24, 2022 by Stacey Higginbotham 1 Comment

The biggest news in the internet of things this week was the staggering story about Amazon’s Alexa business being responsible for the majority of an estimated $10 billion loss in the year ahead. So Kevin and I discuss what Amazon pulling back on Alexa might look like and what it means for voice and the smart home. Then we talk about how a newly available Amazon device signals Amazon’s problem and the potential solutions to that problem. After talking about voice, we take a look at a new controller from Aqara that uses gestures and share our thoughts about the form factor.  After all our user interaction talk, we then cover some news, such as the FIDO Alliance planning to work on security and authentication issues for the IoT, Google’s plans for aggregating fitness data, and a new dev kit from T-Mobile. We also talk about new devices from Wyze and Firewalla. Finally, we answer a listener’s question about connecting LED fairy lights. Then it’s time to talk about the holidays.

The Aqara Cube T1 Pro costs $22.99, and is a fancy button that you can press, roll and shake. Image courtesy of Aqara.

Every year we choose 10 devices that we think make good holiday gifts for our audience and their loved ones. This year we suggest a few in the first part of the show, such as the JaxJox kettlebell and my perennial favorite, the Ember mug. (I gave this to my mom in 2019, and she still uses it every day.) This year’s gifts include a smart plug designed for Matter, a device to reboot your router, and multiple options for smart buttons from Philips Hue and Shortcut Labs. We also include a Nanoleaf option because we’re such fans of the devices as gifts for teens. We also include some fancier gifts for chefs and dog owners. There are more options in this week’s newsletter, but before we sign off we also want to thank our listeners for the gift of their time this year, and the nine years that Kevin and I have been producing this show. Y’all are awesome.

 

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Filed Under: Featured, Podcast Tagged With: alexa, Amazon, Aqara, ARM, Eero, Eve, Everactive, Fi, FIDO Alliance, Firewalla, google, Grid Connect, Meater, Nanoleaf, Philips Hue, Shortcut Labs, Silicon Labs, T-mobile, Wyze

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Comments

  1. Lawrence K says

    November 25, 2022 at 7:39 am

    I have a lot of decorative LED candles and lights that are battery powered as well. I use product 1 below to replace the batteries and plug into AC. Just have to be creative with the wire hiding.

    Product 2 are inexpensive Zigbee smart plugs that I can control with voice assistants. The one thing I like most about these, they work with the Hue Bridge. Now they are Matter accessories, and work with Homekit, ah I mean Apple Home! Boom chaka laka boom!

    1. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0874HWL2L?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details

    2. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08LD7Q81J?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details

    Reply

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