I was enamored by Google and some of the technological excellence they provided for consumers. The Chromecast was genius. Google smart home devices were solid in answering questions. The pulling together of their entire consumer offerings meant I wired up my entire home with a Google home device in every room.
The novelty quickly wore off. We ended up using them for a home-wide speaker system to announce dinner was ready, tell a joke, or turn the HVAC on or off. The more interactive capabilities like asking about facts or converting measurements, etc are simply awkward to do via voice. I often imagine these were developed by single people. Honestly for this reason, I’m guessing the big AI will not be nearly as useful as we think, at least in voice mode.
Most of the Google home devices were ripped out during the “Network is Slow” Project, but this past week I removed the last of them. I simply cannot abide having listening devices for a giant Ad Company in my home anymore. These will all end up in an electronics recycling bin.
This was money wasted in a sense, but I did learn a valuable lesson - technology very rarely increases my quality of life.