We've been using "Alexa" since it came out and we were given one of the early units as a Holiday gift. We still have the original "Echo" in our living room. Have since added an "Echo Dot" on our Lanai and a 3rd "Dot" in the master bedroom. We've played around with lots of the "skills" over the years but find ourselves using Alexa, mostly, for 2 things. One is turning specified lights on or off by voice, the second is as a music source to play Amazon Music, Sirius/XM Radio, Pandora, etc. We can pair our living room unit with the sound system on the TV for music and have a separate speaker on the Lanai we can pair the Dot to. Just like a smartphone or many other examples, you could do 1000 things with it but any given person ends up using only a handful. I'm convinced they are "listening" all of the time. When I say they, I don't mean humans, I mean the devices. I can't count the number of times we've talked about goods or services only to soon later see advertisements or links to similar goods and services come up on our social media. It's creepy but only if/when I feel more violated than that will I remove the devices. I've never had one, but I believe Google Home is a device that performs in very similar ways.
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