The Echo Look is the next version of the Alexa appliance: it has an camera hooked up to a computer vision system, along with its always-on mic, and the first application for it is to watch you as you dress and give you fashion advice (that is, recommend clothes you can order from Amazon).
Amazon has announced it will store audio and video from your bedroom forever, or until you explicitly delete them.
More than anything, this is evidence of the bitter rivalry between Amazon and Netflix: evidently, that rivalry extends to not ever, ever watching Black Mirror, not even a single episode.
Motherboard also asked if Echo Look photos, videos, and the data gleaned from them would be sold to third parties; the company did not address that question.As technosociologist Zeynep Tufekci points out, machine learning combined with full-length photos and videos have at least the potential to be used for much more than selling you clothes or serving you ads. Amazon will have the capability to detect if you’re pregnant and may be able to learn if you’re depressed. Her whole thread is worth reading.
Amazon Wants to Put a Camera and Microphone in Your Bedroom
[Jason Koebler/Motherboard]