Comment on Alexa had “no profit timeline,” cost Amazon $25 billion in 4 years

radivojevic@discuss.online ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

• EmilyIsTrans@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  I’m very skeptical that the data Alexa collects is anywhere near as valuable as people seem to believe it is.

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  • wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    On the highest level, they have a constant firehose of as much audio data from a sea of customers as they wish.

    Send it to cheap overseas transcribers, use it to train and improve voice recognition and automatic transcription.

    Have a backchannel to television viewing and music listening patterns.

    Know when different customers are home or not, improving demographics data.

    Know what is discussed within the house for data on ad penetration/reach, brand awareness, and better advertisement targeting.

    It’s not a direct data to money pipeline, but having an always on listening device in someone’s home nets you a ton of useful data as an online retailer and advertiser.

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    • EmilyIsTrans@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      having an always on listening device in someone’s home

      They very explicitly do not collect audio when you haven’t used a wake word or activated it some other way. They will not “know what is discussed within the house for data on ad penetration/reach” (which is pretty much the only valuable data you’ve mentioned here), nor will they “have a backchannel to television viewing and music listening patterns” unless you actively discuss it with your device.

      I’m not going to put words in your mouth, but if whoever reads this is thinking of replying “are you going to trust that” etc, yes I am. We can track which data an Alexa transmits in real time and directly verify this “always listening” isn’t happening. Even if we couldn’t independently verify that his is the case, and lets say they contradict their privacy policy and public statements and do it anyway, that’s a crazy liability nightmare. Amazon has more than enough lawyers to know that unconsentually recording someone and using that data is very illegal in most places, and would open them up to so many lawsuits if they accidentally leaked or mishandled the data. Take the conspiracy hat off and put your thinking cap on.

      Send it to cheap overseas transcribers, use it to train and improve voice recognition and automatic transcription.

      Bad for privacy, but also not a $25 billion dollar source of revenue.

      Alexa, Google Home, and Siri devices are not good sources of data. If they were, why would Google, king of kings when it comes to data collection, be cutting their Assistant teams so much?

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      • radivojevic@discuss.online ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        No company blows 25 billion on purpose without a reason

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      • prole@beehaw.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        [deleted]

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      • corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        But jumping at the shadows is sometimes all the exercise we get!

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    • FlashMobOfOne@beehaw.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      And who knows what secrets they may be trading for favors as well?

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      • corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca ⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        Are confusing Alexa and Trump?

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