Amazon enables free calls and messages on all Echo devices with Alexa Calling

Re:Amazon enables free calls and messages on all Echo device... by ghurtado on Tuesday May 09, 2017 @03:14PM (#14303006)

> What person would ever want this "feature"?

The disabled come to mind, for starters. The elderly, assisted living, I can think of a few use cases.

Do you remember the Nextel phones? (push to talk) They were annoying as all hell in a corporate setting, but had some very valid use cases in a lot of industries, to the point of being the #1 feature of a Nextel.

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Re:Amazon enables free calls and messages on all Echo device... by cptskippy on Tuesday May 09, 2017 @04:11PM (#14303418)

There are definitely use cases for them. I was talking to a nurse the other day who was trying to track someone down on campus and she lamented "I wish we could just go back to our old Nextels".

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Re:Amazon enables free calls and messages on all Echo device... by derefr on Tuesday May 09, 2017 @07:44PM (#14304826)

Given that both sides of the link are fixed, rather than mobile, devices, Nextel phones aren't quite the right comparison here. Essentially this is a video intercom.

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