I need some help with ethical alternatives to #Alexa, #Siri and #GoogleHome.
The main open source voice assistants seem to be #Mycroft and #Snips:
Mycroft AI
https://mycroft.ai/
Snips AI
https://snips.ai/
Any others?
Does anyone have opinions about how well the #alternatives respect people's #privacy?
Is it correct that Mycroft is centralised (voice queries via a central server) and Snips is decentralised (voice queries locally on the device)?
So, is the plan for Mycroft to decentralise the servers, so that people could choose who handles their query?
Magikarp @switchingsocial here is the conversation I was referring to:
https://community.mycroft.ai/t/self-hosted-server/1266/11
I don't know much about the plan for the team at Mycroft.
It actually looks like it's already possible to self-host a mycroft server
Keep me / us informed if you dive into the project of self-hosting that kind of technology, a feedback would be awesome
Thanks for the link, it does sound like it might happen, but it's still a long way to go.
I'm not hosting (I am not techie enough!) but hopefully try it out if the option becomes available.
@switchingsocial @magikarp afaik, even if you were to run it self-hosted, there's a central auth server you have to log into that keeps track of your plugins and stuff? and there's not even code available to self-host that. so that's bad.
mycroft's definitely not for me, but this was the first i'd heard of snips!
true
same, looks fine
could'nt find link to the source code from their website, tho
@sireebob @switchingsocial oh, that's because they're going the modular way, and published parts of source code and « are committed to open sourcing the rest of the platform in the near future.»
@switchingsocial there's gladys also.
@switchingsocial
Most "ethical" alternative to Internet connected wiretaps that always listen is nothing.
Go start your music and look your shit up yourself.
Well, yes, it is literally from "1984":
"The telescreen recieved and transmitted simultaneously. Any sound Winston made, above the level of a very low whisper, would be picked up by it ... There was of course no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given moment. ...they could plug in your wire whenever the wanted to. You had to live in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every movement scrutinized."
😱
But if the query was handled locally with a non-connected AI, that might be an ethical alternative for people who genuinely need a handsfree control (for example disabled people) or those who just want a cool toy.
@switchingsocial I have to say I'm amazed at how many alternatives you've found that I simply assumed would never even exist!
I think the Facebook/Google/Microsoft privacy shenanigans has made people more interested in privacy-friendly services 👍
@switchingsocial Mycroft is centralized by default, but you can setup your own backend. It is Open Source. I talked to the CEO some and he is keen on building a backend that you can have in your own home and owned by you. It is on their roadmap, but not yet complete (it is after the Mark II).
So while centralized today by default, hopefully not forever.
Wow, looks like this was the right day to look for unconnected alternatives to #GoogleHome:
@switchingsocial
OMG, imagine if they bricked their own devices
@switchingsocial I looked into them a while ago. They're all centralized-by-default but you can - in an extremely skunkworks way - get them running on local hardware instead.
Mozilla are trying to make the local alternative better with Common Voice and DeepSpeech: https://github.com/mozilla/DeepSpeech but it's really not up for prime time yet
@switchingsocial oh, no, I'm wrong about snips
But not FOSS (yet?)
I'm not sure, but Snips says it's open source on its site?
@switchingsocial I read "it will be soon", not " it is now" on their site. Scanning github, their main stuff is not there
I'm just looking at their roadmap, they're not formally launching until 2020 so I guess there's time to see what happens.
@switchingsocial interesting, CC-NC license. It seems to use Google Cloud Speech to do the voice recognition - https://github.com/GladysProject/gladys-voice
There's also Jarvis - http://hellojarvis.io/ - again, centralized by default
@lupine @switchingsocial the conclusion I get so far is that nothing yet is satisfactory.
Go figure.
I guess the most promising is Snips as it's aiming to be an independent offline system?
It's the phoning home that is most concerning about voice assistants. It makes you wonder if the service is just an excuse to gather data.
If there's no phoning home, that would be quite reassuring.
@switchingsocial there is also Gladys that is decentralized/local only and open
https://gladysproject.com/fr/
@switchingsocial I've read that Mycroft servers can't be self-hosted, your own Mycroft device will need to register with the centralised server. I've also read that the devs are working on it, and that it is not meant to stay like this.
My point is that it's not actually where (locally on device / remotely on a server) is the voice query executed, but who owns / manages / etc. this place