Amazon has a whole new generation of Echo speakers coming, and some of them are making bold moves.
One of the biggest changes is coming to the Echo Studio, which now has… a camera. The aptly named Echo Studio with Home Camera takes Amazon’s flagship smart speaker and adds a layer of visual intelligence on top. With the new on-device camera, you can ask Alexa about objects in a room (Amazon suggests holding up a board game and asking the speaker how to play it), or use it as a home video feed to surveil your living room (sorry, kids).
One interesting feature that Amazon demoed is video calling. Panos Panay, Amazon’s senior vice president of devices, actually called his parents with the new Echo Studio at a press-only event prior to the launch, and it seemed to work just fine. Yes, you could just, you know, FaceTime, but honestly there is something nice about not having to hold a phone while video calling—plus this does make video calling with larger groups easier.
Whether people will want to put an Amazon camera in their living room is another story, though plenty have already done so via Ring , which Amazon owns. Amazon says there are visual indicators (a light) on the Echo Studio with Home Camera that tell you when the camera is activated, and you can deactivate the camera with a button if you want. Visual information is processed in the cloud, too, so you should keep that in mind when/if you’re using one.
Source link
