It's the Echo using your own speaker (it has a tiny one still). The "ordering through your existing FireTV/Echo" is just a stupid marketing ploy. As far as we know right not it does not talk to other Echo's on your network (no proxying/grid/mesh/etc).
Ah, I didn't notice that it hooks up to existing speakers. I'm curious how many people will use that however. My anecdotal experience is that most of the people that actually own an Echo are fairly tech illiterate and benefit from it being an self contained package, but that may change if the Echo API is extended.
You could put a Dot in your car. It's USB powered and you can plug it into your stereo with an AUX cable or some such. You would just need to tether your phone's wifi or have some other in-car wifi solution.
Lots of issues with hacking something together like that, though -- I really want something which ties into vehicle sensors, the can handle calls/mute/etc., mixing nav + voice + music dynamically, etc.
At that point it's basically worth building a car computer. Possibly using Alexa for the voice, but if I'm doing a car computer, I think a hack to work with Cortana or Google or Siri might be easier.
It's amazing no one has done a good job of this yet -- it's been within feasible for 10y, and commercially viable for 5y for big companies, or 2-3y for startups just using existing hw. I think it's because not enough good product/dev/etc. people have 1h+ car commutes.
I would be super interested in Echo in my car, but mostly because I don't have one of the fancy new cars that connects to my phone over bluetooth for that sort of stuff.
Me too -- I love my car (06 Audi) but the electronics were designed by a car company in 2000-2004 and thus very far out of date.
The right choice is probably a replacement nav and head unit. I'd rather have an old but nice car with great nav/ ent/etc, than a new car. I don't think I'm that unusual. I'd like to upgrade the electronics every couple years; happy to keep a car for 10-20y. Somehow those should mesh, but don't.
