I agree that robot vacuums sometimes turn on for no good reason, but Alexa has a whisper mode that works really well.

GQ.

One of my pet peeves for the last 30 years has been that microwaves beep when they are done and toaster ovens tick tick tick while toasting and then ding at the end. No way to sneak food without your SO knowing and if they are sleeping it might wake them. Maybe some appliance now have a way to shut off some of those noises. I know on my clothes dryer I can make the ding when ready silent.

Even if the lights are attached to Alexa, can’t you still turn them on and off manually?

When I bought my Porsche in 2007 the key fob had one button to lock and unlock. A very simple design, fewer buttons on the fob, but as you walked away from your car if you weren’t sure if you locked it, and you pressed the button, you might be unlocking it!! I blamed that on young, single, male, engineers. That was my guess anyway. Even add in German for another stereotype. Oh, and childless.

More like they’re designed for the geeks in the house who understand how it works. The rest will just manually turn things on.

We are engineering laziness into everything. I understand convenience but the desire to have a Jetson’s home has gone too far.

I’m not sure these things were designed for singles but they do make life easier.

My Google nest speakers are handy – turning on the lights when I am driving home in the dark, playing music from room to room, looking up stuff without the need to go someplace else – these are conveniences, not necessities, but they are handy.

What I haven’t gotten into (yet) is the IFTTT operations (if This then that) which allow for multiple actions and decision trees. Maybe I will play with those next week. I can see how creating a multi-step complex set of actions could be handy.

@longgone Whisper mode? Yikes! I think it is creepy enough having Alexa listening in to normal speech. That seems over the top!

I would just use a switch. Are we really that lazy? We can consider getting up from the desk exercise to prevent deep vein thrombosis.

@LuckyGuy It is pretty creepy. I just asked ours “Why can you whisper?”, and she told me it’s because people take naptime so seriously. Fair enough. That quiet robot voice, though…could certainly feature in a nightmare.

We’ve got some automation going in our home. The lights all have physical switches. The door lock can be turned manually. The thermostat has manual controls, as does our remote thermometer/humidity sensor. Manual control was a must have for our home automation. That said, it’s nice having the door lock automatically at night, and unlock when we arrive home (plus having the entry lights turn on). Our outdoor lights turn on at sunset and off at midnight. I can remotely unlock my door if I ever needed to let in a friend/family member, and know the door will be locked automatically when I leave.

We were fully automated for a while but…. our garage door would randomly open and that was enough for me to be done with any physical automation that was not designed by me. Don’t even have a smart thermostat anymore. I do have some things on a non-routable network though.

My brother and my friend have Alexa. They use it for voice-commanded music. They are younger than me.

I have Wemo, Arlo, Ring, Roomba at home but none with voice control. I feel stupid talking to a computer.

My wife’s office tried setting up Siri for music, but my wife’s name is Sheree. Every time someone called her name, Siri would try to do something. So that was a no go.

I never automated my house but I did have Alexa for a while. I put her away when she started participating in conversations I was having with a friend __in another room__. And marketing and privacy shit.