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Amazon Steps Into Communications With Amazon Chime

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Amazon Chime, Amazon’s latest app was introduced  toady – an app that focuses on communications for businesses. This app allows the users to easily set up meetings, make voice and video calls, group chats, share their screen, and much more. The app might sound a little like Skype, but it has been designed for corporate communications, and has been designed keeping in mind the mobile users. Amazon Chime has released today for the users of Android, iOS, Windows and Mac. Let us take a look at the benefits of this app –

Amazon Chime 1

Benefits of Amazon Chime:

  • Amazon Chime offers the users with a platform to make crisp and clear HD audio and video calls. The company says it is so good that it feels like you are sitting in the same room with the person you are talking to!
  • Managing meetings too, has become a lot easier with Amazon Chime. In the past, users needed to send out multiple invites, and set up passcodes allowing users to join in, and then it was also tedious to monitor who’s in the conversation. It has all become much easier with Amazon Chime. Users can simply send out a meeting invite, and all the other participants will get a notification before the meeting begins. Those who may be late can tap a button to notify the other members of the meeting.
  • Screen sharing too, has been made much easier and simpler. It enhances collaboration, especially when people from different work locations are working together. It also provides chat-rooms where people who are working on the same project can easily interact with each other.
  • Cross platform support is another highlight of this app. Users can easily switch from any platform to any other platform, while being in the meeting!

The company has offered three plans – a free, basic plan that allows the bare minimums, a Chime Plus plan that allows easier user management, and a Chime Pro plan, that opens all doors and possibilities – making it the ultimate corporate communications app. Amazon Chime Plus is priced in at $2.5 per user per month and Chime Pro comes in at $15 per user per month.

First FFRD Intel based speaker will Make its Showstopping Entry in 2017

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FFRD-Alexa smart Intel based speaker will arrive in first quarter of 2017.
FFRD-Alexa smart Intel based speaker will arrive in first quarter of 2017.

Back in 2013, Facebook and Intel joined their forces together to work on photonics with the aim to empower data centers with swift data connectivity (100 gigabits/second). This time, Intel had set its sight for the largest online retailer of the world. Yep, that’s Amazon. This collaboration is likely to bring a series of new inventions in smart home gadgets. Intel based speaker being the first one on this list. The corporate giants announced its release along with AWS (Amazon Web Services) at the re:Invent conference held in Las Vegas this week.


What’s the Big Deal about Intel Based Speaker?

They’re going to sweep all users off their feet with the cutting edge FFRD technology. FFRD or Form Factor Reference Design is a custom-tailored modular board design. It is developed to fit inside a design frame. This saves time on developing a new board layout. The brand new audio player will include our favorite virtual assistant Alexa.


Mutual Sharing of Technology will Help Both Companies

Amazon knew it cannot explore novel possibilities in audio digital assistance by keeping Alexa restricted to Echo speakers. Therefore, they chalked out this partnership to open third-party integration. This unique technology amalgam will help both developers design a variety of gadgets with Alexa on board. Amazon is the happiest out of the two since its JAM Voice has already arrived in the tech market this Thursday.

JAM portable speakers are laced with touch-activated integration, AVS (Alexa Voice Service), Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connectivity that make it one of the smartest devices present in the market today. However, it’s nothing like the first FFDR Intel based speaker that is due in the initial months of 2017.

The said product is rumored to support Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, Z-Wave and Zigbee. Thus, ensuring complete connective inside homes and offices. They’ll rope in Amazon’s voice settings and Intel’s architecture. Amazon will be developing SDK that is Software Development Kit in the near future. This reference design will make it easy for manufacturers to integrate audio/video features in electronic products.
This surely got you excited, isn’t it?

 

Amazon Music Unlimited Is Finally Here

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Rumors have been swirling around Amazon’s plans to launch its own, standalone music streaming service, and now those reports have been proven out: the company is today announcing the launch of Amazon Music Unlimited. This new, on-demand streaming service offers access to tens of millions of songs, and is available for $7.99 per month for Prime members, or $9.99 per month for non-Prime members. Amazon has also launched a “for Echo” subscription plan that lets you listen only on its connected speakers for just $3.99 per month.

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The Echo-only plan confirms the earlier report from Recode which said a second service aimed at owners of Amazon Echo hardware would help differentiate Amazon Music Unlimited from rivals. This isn’t Amazon’s first foray into music streaming. Prime membership has included access to Amazon Music before today’s launch, but with a more limited catalog.

Amazon Prime members could access over two million songs, as well as over a thousand playlists and personalized stations. Amazon Music Unlimited is a big step up from that, with “tens of millions” of songs from the major labels Sony, Universal, and Warner, plus thousands of indies, as well as thousands of playlists and personalized stations. A family subscription plan for up to 6 people is not live today, but will arrive later this year for $14.99/month or $149/year. Prime members can also choose to pay $79 per year (which works out to $6.58/month).

The service supports standard features like offline listening, and is free of advertising. It works across any Amazon Music compatible device, including the Amazon Echo, Echo Dot and Amazon Tap, Fire devices like Amazon Fire TV and Fire tablets, iOS, Android, the web, PCs and Macs, Sonos, Bose, and others. Although the new service will compete in a crowded landscape against rivals like Apple Music, Google Play Music/YouTube Red, Spotify, and even Pandora’s newly announced discounted tiers, what makes Amazon Prime Unlimited most interesting is its “Echo-only” plan.

Google Home Set To Be Cheaper Than Amazon Echo

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Google Home, the company’s competitor to the Amazon Echo, is now available for preorder. It will cost $129, cheaper than Amazon’s device. You can preorder it today in the US and it will start shipping November 4th. In our brief testing, it was a little smarter than Siri and a lot sharper than Alexa, able to understand context in a question and suss out information from around the web when Google’s knowledge graph didn’t have the answer.

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The top of Google Home is touch-sensitive and can be used to change the volume or pause whatever is playing. It has three speakers Google calls them “extrusion speakers” although it’s not clear what that adjective means here. The overall sound quality is a little better than the Echo, but nothing you would replace a serious home sound system with. The device is white, and its design was apparently inspired by household items like candles and wine glasses. The bottom grille can be swapped out, and comes in multiple colors.

Google Home works natively with YouTube Music and Google Play Music, and comes with six months free of YouTube Red. If Google isn’t your service of choice for music, Home integrates with Spotify, Pandora, iHeartRadio, and TuneIn. You can set the default music service for voice commands to be one of these third-party services if you prefer that to Google’s services. Home also acts as a Chromecast Audio receiver, so you can choose to cast the music to any Chromecast-connected television or speakers in the house, and you can play music in multiple rooms at once.

At this point there are a lot of devices that are listening for a prompt like “OK Google.” The company’s goal is to figure out which device is closest to you, and use that gadget to respond. It has only two microphones for listening, instead of the Echo’s seven. But in our brief testing it had a remarkable ability to pinpoint a speaker’s location, and responded on whatever Google device was closest: your Home, your phone, or your smartwatch. Right now Google Home works with a few third-party services. You can use it to call an Uber or play music from Spotify. Google says an API for third-party apps is coming soon, but at launch there will be a limited number of services that can hook into Google Home. Amazon’s Alexa has a big head start here, having already integrated with more than 3,000 services.

New Kindle From Amazon – Thinner, Lighter and Cheaper Than Ever Before!

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Amazon has been among some of the biggest names in the markets of technology, and what truly makes them as big as they are is the fact that they have been diverse. The company operates their business across various fields, and they have been innovating the markets at quite a rapid pace. They have been coming out with a lot of services and offerings ranging from the e-tail to the servers to the Amazon Echo. One of the key offerings of Amazon is that of the Kindle. The company has just announced a new kindle device which will be coming out into the markets with some of their biggest innovations and improvements.

Amazon Kindle

The new kindle from Amazon now offers a thinner and lighter experience than ever before. Weighing in at a little over 160 grams, and measuring a thickness of just 9.1mm, the new kindle is not just thinner and lighter, but the thinnest and lightest kindle device ever created. This new kindle comes out into the markets with two variants in terms of color – black and white.

Other than being incredibly thin and incredibly light, the new kindle is also coming out with some new and improved features such as Bluetooth audio for helping the blind, and with several other features such as the ability to e-mail notes to yourself, or highlight the text in PDF and spreadsheet formats. These new features are indeed quite helpful and help take the company major steps forward in the markets.

The device has been made more rounded than the previous models, and it feels much more comfortable and book-like to hold. This new kindle comes out into the markets in two variants – black and white, and will be coming out with twice the memory when compared to the previous devices.

This is indeed a major step up for Amazon, and for the markets of e-book readers at large!

 

Alexa by Amazon is now able to understand 1000 commands:

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Alexa by Amazon has proved to be the biggest competitor for similar devices like Google home. However, in the light of the recent development that have come by with this voice assistant, it seems like the other devices will have a very hard time trying to surpass it. This is because the alaqsa has taken a lead of 1000 commands and third party skills that it can use to make the life of people across the globe easier.

Although it looks like nothing but a sleek looking cylinder in the corner of your room the Amazon echo which has Alexa in its hard can be used for ordering a pizza or for calling a Uber cabs for your friend. The same can be for other Amazon devices you use Alexa like fire TV as well. Ever since the company tasted success so its new devices it has been working day in and day out to improve Alexa. The efforts of this hour soon going to be paid off.

However, it is not the effort of Alex are alone and is helping Amazon to achieve these skills. It has been able to succeed with the help of the brands with which it can work. For example Dominos has extended help in order to teach the device how to order a pizza. Fitbit and Kayak have also added similar kind of value tothe devices. Developers some across the globe are working hard enough to create new features for this artificial intelligence controlling the community.

The best part of it is that when something becomes as smart as Alexa then carrying out activities around your house without any problems. As of now it is not yet cleared is more development would be brought out for the world’s to see.Rumour has it that the device will have another major competitor that is going to be powered by Siri. This product will be launched apparently buy apple in the worldwide developers conference that will be held later this month.

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