Amazon Echo Show will Integrate with Home Security Cameras
The Amazon Echo Show is due to ship next week. The initial announcement in May highlighted the ability to connect by video calling with family members and drop in to see images from other rooms with a device. Today, Amazon announced in a blog post that several home security cameras vendors have integrated with Echo Show and can beam feeds directly to the device.
Companies like Ring, Arlo, Nest, August, EZViz, Vivint, Amcrest, Logitech, and IC Realtime have already created Alexa skills leveraging the new cameras capability.
The makers of the Ring Doorbell WiFi camera demonstrated how you can simply say, “Alexa, show me the front door,” to activate a live feed.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=102&v=8fyWJ-Hkelk
Similarly, Arlo video cameras for the home can enable you to see what is in other rooms right from your Echo Show. An Arlo developer in the video below comments:
So, let’s say we are in the kitchen today with our Echo Show and we wanted to check in on the kids. We could say, “Alexa, show us David’s room.” Echo Show will actually load a live view of the Arlo camera and we can tune in and see what’s going on.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=dF6JQBMNyHg
Integrating Video with Voice Control
This is a nice use case for consumers with home security cameras and highlights how voice provides added convenience. These cameras are WiFi enabled and can already stream video to smartphones. However, that requires you to grab the phone, unlock it, pull up the app and then navigate to the video feed. Voice input eliminates all of those steps. Granted, you must be near the Echo Show for this to work. However, hands free viewing of the video stream of a visitor at the front door or into your child’s bedroom can be very helpful when you are in the kitchen and need hands free access. It’s just one more little benefit beyond video calling that may motivate consumers to try the device.
Amazon is Always Planning Ahead
It seems that each Amazon device has a plan to make it useful in multiple scenarios. The Echo can be used for entertainment, home automation control, information access, making phone calls, sending text messages and using simple utilities. The Dash Wand can be helpful for voice input or barcode scanning input for product ordering. You can imagine Echo Look not only being used for the “Style Check” but also for selfies. The Echo Show can be used for video calling family, acting as an intercom and now to view home security camera feeds. The Alexa-powered product portfolio is about addressing many in-home use cases and for each product to offer multiple utilities.
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