Google Nest

[Hot Flatus]

I have received one of these from my ISP.

what is the point of it 

[grams]

Why don't you ask it?

[Mr Larrington]

I have received one of these from my ISP.

what is the point of it 

To encourage you to change your ISP?

Apparently the Nest Mini makes “[y]our music sounds bigger and better than ever”.

Somehow I doubt that a twenty quid piece of plasticky bobbins is going to represent an improvement over a gert big pair of Mission floorstanders.

[Hot Flatus]

It is a called a Google Nest Hub.  Looks like one of those annoying LCD photo frames that were all the rage for a while.

I've read the back of the box. It is saying I can "Command my day" with voice match, and see my personalised events, commute, reminders and more. 

I have literally no idea what this fucking thng is for.

[rafletcher]

Landfill.

[Ham]

I bought mine for use as an alarm clock for which it is excellent, with the slight reservation of an issue that cancelling an alarm* is more inconvenient than warranted (and will likely be fixed at some stage with a software update). The light adjusting display is astonishingly good, the ability to play whatever music you fancy by voice command is handy (unless your selection is  in foreign, I've failed abysmally to get it to play Maite Hontelle, and Drive By Truckers turns into Drive, by Truckers if you are unlucky.

*before it goes off, turing an alarm off that's sounding is easy

[Kim]

I have literally no idea what this fucking thng is for.

Data mining.

[Ham]

I have literally no idea what this fucking thng is for.

Data mining.

Worth mentioning, there is a physical switch for the microphone, which makes sense to use if you are concerned about such things. I doubt most users are aware of its existence or why it could (or, should?) be used.

[jiberjaber]

We got ours for the kitchen for cooking, easier than trying to unlock the phone to see next steps on google'd recipe when hands a caked in 'stuff' 

[Hot Flatus]

I have literally no idea what this fucking thng is for.

Data mining.

Makes sense.

The ISP seem awfully keen that I should "claim" one.

[Polar Bear]

mllePB's father seems to be interested in having one.  He does use his "sponge" (Google speaker) quite a lot.

[Hot Flatus]

He can have mine for £50 if he wants it. I'm going to stick it on ebay in a bit

[Polar Bear]

Happy to take that if you are sure.  PM me if so and we can sort something.

[Hot Flatus]

Thankyou. I've pm'd you 

[Greenbank]

We use the Amazon equivalent (Echo Dot) in the kitchen. You can just tell it to play a specific radio station or pretty much any song/artist (as we have it linked to Spotify) and it does it. Sound quality is OK for a single (mono) speaker.

My daughter uses it to play music when she has friends round (remember those days!) or help with bits of homework.

I also use it for setting timers when cooking as you can set multiple timers with individual names and you can ask it how long to go on the timers.

So, it does nothing that a phone or a laptop can't do, but being able to do all of that by voice command is actually quite useful. And it's also always there, unlike the laptop or phone.

I was bought it as a Christmas present and set it up wondering if I'll ever really use it but we've got quite used to using it. Haven't found a need to upgrade to one with a screen.

Yes it has a microphone, but no-one has found any evidence of it ever exfiltrating any data that it wasn't supposed to. Amazon are welcome to data mine the data they get from it, can't think how it would be useful at all though.

This whole concept of fearing things with microphones is quite odd. Most people have had mobile phones (and landlines before them) for years and not been worried about them having microphones.

[Hot Flatus]

You think?

Ever met anyone who works for G***?

Phone goes in the microwave, in another room, for conversations.

[robgul]

I have literally no idea what this fucking thng is for.

Data mining.

Indeed - and rather worrying that it's product from Mr Google -  Nest, even just for central heating, gives them all sorts of info with which to intrude on your life.

Admittedly we have Hive on our heating and that provides British Gas with all sorts of data ("Do you know how your heating levels compare with others in your area?" - no, and I don't care) - we just have it as it's pretty clever and flexible to manage heating and some appliances/lights - especially the remote switching. [Turning on the espresso machine when we're 40 minutes away from home on the way back is useful!]   Our research showed that Google Nest wasn't as flexible/useful AND had the intrusion factor.

[ian]

I honestly don't much care if Amazon are listening to me (we have Alexa). I'd like to teach their learning machines how to swear in perfect harmony. I might change my mind if the expletive politely police kick down the door. Let's hope they don't do a browser cache inspection.

It's actually quite useful to be able to ask for a particular song when I'm elbow-deep in flour or for the lights to come on when I'm carrying plates full of food to the dining room. In olden times, of course, you'd ask your woman to do this. But the more recent versions, I find, have reduced functionality in this department.

[MikeFromLFE]

Landfill.

Stick it on fleabay - it'll sell

[Hot Flatus]

I'm sure it would but Polar Bear has snapped it up already.

[MikeFromLFE]

We have three Google dots and two Alexa things (don't ask how we've ended up with this muddle) and use them extensively for radio listening and controlling lights.
If there's someone at Google Central listening to me farting, then they're welcome to all the joy they can get from it.
The best 'add on' I've bought has been a battery pack for Alexa - now Amazon HQ can listen to me on the crapper as well as in the shower. Win-win for me and them.

[ian]

I'm sure it would but Polar Bear has snapped it up already.

Shame, if you'd saved it, Google-lady would have – on command – displayed live footage of The Rogeriusaurus prowling the wooded car parks of the Swindon hinterlands like a concupiscent tomcat. Or Pornhub if your interests are more conventional.

[Hot Flatus]

Anyone remember that photoshopped thing I did of roger peering out of trees at some small boys?   I expect Jaded has it filed somewhere.