I’m ready for a wild night! Mark Starling is in the his-ouse and I wished work wasn’t bogging me down. I spent the last two days at the AWS Public Sector Summit and today I’m on the roof with Mark Starling, Seth, John, and the First News 570 crew. This week’s top tech stories: Amazon asks you to apply to buy its latest product, Instagram for Kids is paused by Facebook, and brand influencers cuss out the industries they flaunt. You can listen to Mark and I point and laugh while talking about the wild and crazy technology world every Thursday morning, LIVE at 6:43am Eastern.
NEW ASTRO MAY HAVE DEATH WISH CLAIMS DEVELOPERS
Not the mini-van. For the past two days, yours truly was one of the denizens of the AWS faithful and attended the AWS Public Sector Summit in Washington, DC. I haaaddd a ball, but it was work. Yesterday, while I was getting my last hobnob in with AWS executives, the company with the Smile on the Box announced Astro. A $999 robot you have to apply to buy. Astro is a household robot for home monitoring. It’s an Alexa powered, motorized little gadget with cameras, speakers, and a microphone for you to keep an eye on your stuff. It has a detachable cupholder that can also be used for bringing you drinks, snacks, and other miscellaneous items. Despite being an Alexa powered monitoring device, Astro is built for data privacy according to Amazon and can have its cameras, microphones and other sensors turned off. I think Astro is adorable. Amazon’s developers on the other hand disagree with Amazon having to come to Astro’s defense even before its released. Amazon engineers have said Astro is actually terrible, and has been known to roll itself down the stairs ending its digital life. Furthermore, leaks as reported by Vice has said Astro’s parts are prone to breaking. Look, I think this is great. My parents bought my sister and I remote controlled robot with a serving tray and microphone. I loved the thing! I hope Astro thrives. Astro is available by invite only. You know what I’ve done. I bow down to our robot overlords.
