I always thought Alexa was just a play to get more data, especially data about apps/services outside Amazon's ecosystem. Every time you tell Alexa to play a song (on Spotify) or turn up the temperature (on the smart thermostat), Amazon is analyzing that data. Maybe they'll start showing you ads for sweaters since they know you're always cold. LOL

Also, the more you ask Alexa a question, the less you search on Google. And that's gotta be worth a bunch to Amazon. At least I thought it was.