Is Amazon Writing Checks that Alexa+ Can't Cash?
There's a lot of vagaries and obfuscation around this launch...
Look, I was already skeptical of Amazon's ability to make Alexa truly "remarkable" again ahead of their event last week. There had simply been too many reports of smoke for there to be no fire around the notion that the company was having a hell of a time bringing their OG voice assistant into our current age of AI. At the same time, I wanted to check my own bias – laid out in a prediction – so I tried to couch my skepticism after the event. Especially since those actually in attendance seemed at least mildly impressed by what they saw and heard. But after listening to Amazon's head of devices and services, Panos Panay, on Nilay Patel's Decoder podcast, I'm actually even more skeptical now.