Siri hasn’t yet gotten the big AI upgrades we’re expecting soon, but it sounds like Alexa’s recent AI revamp is already resulting in at least one user running back to the arms of “old” (current) Siri.
Troubles with the new Alexa have made Siri look good
Jennifer Pattison Tuohy writes at The Verge:
I’ve used Alexa to manage my shopping list for years. There are plenty of great list apps out there, but the convenience of adding items by voice anywhere in my house, pulling up the list on an Echo Show in the kitchen, and having it on my phone via the Alexa app has worked well for me. Until it didn’t.
Alexa Plus, combined with a redesign of the Alexa app that puts the generative AI-powered assistant front and center, has made the entire process so irritating that I’ve reluctantly switched to Apple’s Reminders app and Siri.
I was immediately grabbed by the stellar headline: “The Alexa app is so bad I’m using Siri again.”
The full article goes into detail on small changes that Alexa’s app has made over time driven by two main Amazon priorities:
- AI
- Advertising
With the former, one problem mentioned is the Alexa chatbot text box that appears at the bottom of a list. It prompts users to “Ask Alexa.”
But in a list app, that’s intuitively where you might add new items to your list. Not so in the Alexa app.
It’s the worst place for it, as the instinct is to put what you want to add to your list in there. In the Reminders app, that’s where there’s a nice big plus sign to add an item. But when I typed “butter” into Alexa Plus, I got a guide to butter.
To actually add something to the list, I have to go to the top of the screen, tap add item, which takes me to a second screen where there’s a page of ads for Whole Foods items, and finally, a tiny text box up top where I can type in what I want.
The author describes how it ultimately took six separate taps to get to a place where she could add a new item to the list.
On the note of advertising, the aforementioned Whole Foods ads were the main offender. It makes sense, since Amazon owns Whole Foods and Alexa has shopping capabilities. But forcing Whole Foods groceries on users of a basic shopping list isn’t great.
The whole article is essentially a cautionary tale in new technology making a simple task worse.
Here’s hoping that’s not an issue with Apple’s forthcoming Siri overhaul.
Do you have much experience using Alexa+ and the updated Alexa app? How has that been going for you so far? Let us know in the comments.
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