On: How Alexa dropped the ball on being the top conver...

[ldjkfkdsjnv]

I worked on a research team in Alexa. Almost all projects were focused on short term delivery, non immediate need innovation was highly discouraged. Most models were just direct imports of open source models created by Meta/Google. Extremely short delivery timelines for incremental improvement. Alexa employees were often highly political tenured Amazon employees. Minimal room for growth as they sucked oxygen out of the room.

The Amazon philosophy of constant execution is at odds with large leap technical innovation. It works very well for ops heavy AWS orgs, and supply chain related optimization problems. The company has a cultural problem

Regardless of the above, ChatGPT made almost all NLP technologies across all companies obsolete.

[criddell → ldjkfkdsjnv]

By the way, oxygen is a colorless, odorless gas with an atomic number of eight.

If you would like to know more about elements just say "Alexa, tell me about the periodic table of elements".

[djeastm → criddell]

Alexa's "by the ways" will be its downfall.

What kind of assistant says "by the way" apropos of nothing? An annoying one. It's just a thinly disguised ad that was never asked for.

[chrisjj → criddell]

Oxygen gas is molecular not atomic - at least on this planet.

[criddell → chrisjj]

Your order of "Boost Oxygen Pocket Size Natural Aroma 3 Liter Portable Oxygen Canister, Respiratory Support for Aerobic Recovery, Altitude, Performance and Health" is $23.91 and will be delivered tomorrow.

To check the status of your order, use the Alexa app.

[esafak → criddell]

You sound like Clippy. "It looks like you're writing about oxygen! Would you like to know its chemical properties?"

[rubyfan → ldjkfkdsjnv]

My understanding of Alexa is the thing doesn’t support a business of its own so it’s beholden to showing value to the enterprise through soft or derivative metrics like engagement or LTV. I believe that when a venture doesn’t stand on its own value within a larger enterprise it’s doomed to corporate politics and external optics. This has an ultimately shorter shelf life than something that makes money, in some companies it might be greater than others.

[elbasti → ldjkfkdsjnv]

> Regardless of the above, ChatGPT made almost all NLP technologies across all companies obsolete.

That would be a data point in favor of the amazon strategy, no? Prevented millions upon millions of being invested in developing losing technology.

The window to integrate LLMs (especially from Antrhopic, in which Amazon is an investor) is closing but not shut.

If they can do so well, they have massive distribution power to catch up and drive rapid adoption of alexa 2.0.

[ldjkfkdsjnv → elbasti]

Honestly, yes it is in favor.

[brevitea → ldjkfkdsjnv]

Except execution will be subpar, as it always is.

- Why pay for Alexa 2.0 when you can get an alternative for free? - How to get people to do more than the bare minimum of music, notifications, and home automation? People can't even use lists anymore, because it's being deprecated. Same with Routines.

Alexas have been reduced to ads boxes; junk.

[iknownthing → ldjkfkdsjnv]

Interesting given how many products out there now are negatively described as ChatGPT wrappers. Sounds like Alexa was just an open source model wrapper.

[jjtheblunt → ldjkfkdsjnv]

> Regardless of the above, ChatGPT made almost all NLP technologies across all companies obsolete.

that's overstated, because you accidentally lumped speech recognition in, and i imagine Nuance (https://nuance.com) and others are like "hold my beer".

[realfeel78 → jjtheblunt]

Nope. OpenAI's actually-open-source Whisper blows Nuance and all other legacy speech recognition tech away.

[brevitea → realfeel78]

Whisper definitely blows AWS Transcribe out of the water. And, it's free. So nice.