I wonder how much infrastructure is really required to properly support Alexa like capabilities for an individual. Does Amazon really need all of our recordings on their hardware in their data centers? Is it conceivable that we could own that hardware as well?

I realize that training data is important and I assume the recorded data gets used for that purpose but does Amazon need to keep it forever? How long do they need it? Can I own and posses the hardware and pass off the learning alone?

But even if they say that they're not storing or sending it, how feasible is it to verify that fact?

I don't mean to suggest this is something Amazon would bring to market using an Echo. I mean do you really need Amazon/Apple/Microsoft/Google levels of hardware to run a voice interface for an individual's digital assistant?

Is it feasible to install hardware with the capability of Alexa in the standard user's home?

I think the answer to that is probably "yes", more or less. Some things may be a bit harder to do but I don't see why I need a huge black box in the sky to parse my voice or do some geolocation.

Very feasible -- don't plug it into the Internet.

At which point you have a brick with a microphone, and a pretty blue light, right?

I think the blue lights only show when its connected. You would get pretty red lights

"I'm having trouble understanding you right now."

I have some ideas for a more strict but more user friendly household firewall device and corresponding UI, if something really really needs the Internet.

But your lights, TV, etc. don't live in an Amazon datacenter.

You're right of course, but interesting sidenote: in the murder case I mentioned the police ended up looking at the suspect's smart water meter logs... which showed the use of about 140 gallons of water in the middle of the night. So... no, it doesn't all live in an Amazon datacenter, but it these days it might live somewhere.

Not if it is configured to connect to a server in your home with all the data it needs to function.

Oh of course, but I wonder if by the time you'd created that system, you'd feel the result was worth it? Is what Echo offers really so valuable you'd go through the trouble? I wouldn't.

I don't own an Echo because I don't feel the convenience of such a device is outweighed by the obvious privacy implications. I would be more likely to use it if it was located within my home but at that point the limiting factor would probably be cost. This is why such a device would have to provide additional functionality.

In a world where it is just expected that you have a personal cloud server in your home Alexa becomes an "app" on that server and the Echo continues life as a very nice speaker/microphone device you can place in a visible area in order to interact with that server.

Although I would only consider this developer ready at the moment, ooen efforts like this have promise, at least you have choice what back end if any https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/seeed/respeaker-an-open...

It requires almost nothing. The training process requires large amounts of test data. But once the system is trained, the actual set of weights needed is tiny and running the recognition itself is cake. The whole reason all voice recognition is server-based is purely for business reasons, to lock people into their service, to provide new sources of consumer data to mine and sell, etc.

What's wrong with the police requesting Echo records? Surely the Echo records requests you make to it. No different than Google recording your search history. And it's pretty reasonable for the police to want to look at that in a murder case. And they got a warrant. I don't see anything sinister in this case at all.