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Why Alexa

I have tried long and hard to understand what human need Alexa fills other than our right to be stupid and lazy. To the vast majority of us Alexa is not making the difference between life and death every day - that is the only scenario in which the value proposition makes sense. Alexa Fails are routinely treated as funny even though the implications are anything but. 

I am a Mary Meeker groupie and wait all year like the rest of them to hear her Internet Trends Report. This year, I paid close attention to her take on Voice which culminates in this gem of a slide headlined: Product Finding (Amazon) = Started @ Search...Fulfilled by Amazon. Alexa exists because the human desire for lazy and stupid is so boundless. 

Nirvana will be delivered unto us when I can bark at Alexa in my native language to have that box of Tide be dropped off by drone on my front porch. I am such a hot mess Monday morning because I previously binge watched Netflix all weekend, forgot all my chores and am now out of time to make a grocery run. In the afternoon, while at work I may recall being out of cleaning supplies and the need to tidy up the house before guests come to dinner. So I have Amazon deliver what I need right to the trunk of my car and even have them walk groceries into my house while I am out. If Alexa is any good, she needs to start calling out the time if she knows Netflix has been playing 24 hours straight, check what is in my fridge and order refills. She should have known I am out of Tide - needs to interface better with my smart and connected devices all around my home. I can't be held responsible for taking charge of my life, just need to wait on Amazon's feature release schedule for Alexa.

While Amazon tries to solve these self inflicted problems of my lazy, disorganized and stupid self, those who have the ability to plan ahead don't fare so well. Prime is not nearly what it used to be. Almost everything takes much longer than a couple of days to be delivered and schedule slippage is rife. The seller market place is completely chaotic with each making their own rules of engagement. Since my first purchase from Amazon back when it was still a bookstore until a few years ago, I never had need to call customer service. I assumed their operation was so flawless they never had the need for customer service staff. That has all changed now. 

In the future there may not be room in a society that goes out of its way to cater to the lazy and stupid, for those of us who want to exercise common sense now and then.

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