In the pursuit of happiness
Once upon a time we were happy looking in mirrors and asking our nearest and dearest, "how do I look?". But does the Echo Look spell an end to the hardest question man has had to face? O.K that's 2 silly questions in 2 sentences but this is serious technology that Amazon have.
The ability now to see and help with confidence could be fantastic, but with great power comes great responsibility. That is a lot of data, adding to the mass of data that is already available. With the ability of recommending what to buy, has this talking advert just taken "tailored advertising" too far?
Technology that can see
The Amazon Echo Look can see and inform us of choices that we can make. This could be great, like a helpful shop assistant, someone we can trust. But can technology sold to you really be impartial? Its not really an assistant that is going to say "those shoes don't look old, you don't need a new pair." Its sole purpose is to gain your confidence and help you make choices on purchases. Do you need them? Can you afford them? Not important to everyone but could be important questions for some.
What Amazon have developed has to be commended, new innovation in an online retail industry will give it an edge. But with no real competition and very little government control, who is doing what with your data?
Final words
This is not a sceptical look at what Amazon are doing but a balance looked at how technology is interacting with us. How that data will be used and how this could affect us as users of services provided by Amazon is going to be exponential. The idea that an all powerful internet company is in our homes and seeing us and informing us can give us security and support or could fill us with doubt and confusion.
Technology is a wonderful thing, how do we use it? Only time will tell.
