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Comment by madamelic | Hacker News Reader

>Why can't you just stand up and, you know, flick the light switch?

Because it is more efficient to yell at Alexa "Turn off the bathroom lights" than stand up, walk to the bathroom and turn them off.

Or better yet, having all your lights and things turning on as you walk in the door. Or having Alexa wake you up by turning on your lights slowly.

Or baking something and telling Alexa to set a timer. No more having to type into Google "20 minute timer" then remembering to keep that tab open and your sound on.

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Bunch of we-don't-like-options luddites in here. I'm surprised people aren't modding their cars with a hand crank b/c

> why can't you just get the crank, walk up front, and start it manually, instead of turning a key like a princess.

Yelling at my home is on my top 10 favorite things about this century so far. I tried for decades to utilize the force to get the lights on/off or grab the tv remote. Burst a blood vessel in my eye trying one night. Never worked.

No more having to glance at the clock on the wall (or the stove, or the microwave, or whatever) and mentally noting "in 20 minutes, it will be half-past".

And then forgetting because that tricky synchronisatiin problem from work pops into your head and you wander off...

Maybe you should have just turned off the light on your way out of the bathroom.

Gee, thanks captain hindsight!

> than stand up, walk to the bathroom and turn them off.

> No more having to type into Google "20 minute timer" then remembering to keep that tab open and your sound on.

The horror

If you're baking or cooking, your hands are often covered with things you don't want to smear all over your phone, and saying "Alexa, how many tablespoons are in a quarter of a cup?" starts to seem pretty practical.

Erm... I have a cooking timer. It's spring-operated, you turn it left to the max and then turn right to set the time. I specifically bought it so I don't need a battery in the kitchen, because I have a battery timer, too (I still use it sometimes, because of how loud it is).

You don't really need a whole unwieldy computer to just call you after 20 minutes.

No one is saying that you need an amazon echo to do anything - obviously you could just use a physical timer, or pull out a calculator or a book to do conversions. The point is the echo makes it more convenient.

I have my hue lights synced so when my echo timer goes off, my living room lights flash. No more missing a timer because I was distracted in another room and didn't hear it.

Still requires physical contact and cleaning if your hands are dirty from cooking.

How well does that work when you're working on three different things in the kitchen, and they each need timing?

Yes, a mechanical egg timer is still a timer, and still functional. But so were sand timers. A mechanical clock still works, but many people still use digital clocks now a days.

I like the hands-free nature of the Echo timers, so I can set a timer while I still have dough or raw meat on my hands. And like I said, I can have an oven timer going while I have a timer for my pasta on the stove, and any variety of things I care to time (my kid's 5 minute timeout for fighting with his brother, for example).

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