How to Fight Cabin Fever With Family-Friendly Alexa Games - Wirecutter

In this new normal, as we all try to squeeze our work life, school life, and home life into one big communal life (in one very small space), reliable ways to keep the kids occupied and at peace are as valuable as jumbo-size rolls of toilet paper. Our discovery: Amazon’s Alexa happens to have dozens of voice-based games built in (many of them really good; some not so much), and so it is a terrific tool for keeping the kids entertained without resorting to more screen time. To launch one of these games, just ask Alexa to open or play them by name (no need to install a Skill, as you did in the past).

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Best Edison-style filament smart bulbs to make your home glow - The Ambient

Vintage-style filament bulbs from Hue, Bulbrite, Ikea and more tested and rated.

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How to Reduce Your Energy Bill (in Any Season) With a Single Smart Home Device - The Wirecutter

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The Best Smart Garage-Door Controller | The Wirecutter

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How Sensors Make Smart Homes Smarter

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Best Smart Home Sensors for Alexa

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Best Smart Home Sensors for HomeKit

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Best Smart Home Sensors for SmartThings

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August halts shipping of View doorbell camera, offers customers refunds - The Ambient

Smart doorbell and lock maker August has announced it is halting shipping of its new August View doorbell camera, due to problems related to Wi-Fi connectivity.

As we noted in our review, the doorbell camera frequently disconnected from the Wi-Fi network, rendering it useless as a doorbell camera. August told us that it was using a new Wi-Fi chip in the View, specifically designed to run the battery-powered doorbell on low power until an event wakes it up.

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Google kills Works with Nest as it prepares for a Google Assistant future

Works with Nest, the platform built to get smart home devices talking to Nest products, is shutting down, Google has announced. The service will close on 31 August and will be replaced by Works with Google Assistant, Google’s services-based developer platform that the search giant is evolving into a smart home ecosystem. As of the end of August, all Works with Nest integrations will stop operating and developers must either transition their products to the new platform or end their compatibility with Nest’s suite of smart home products.

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How to Survive the End of Works With Nest - Wirecutter.com

We recommend several Nest products at Wirecutter, along with many devices that work with them, and that integration is often crucial to how people use their devices. But the recent news that Google is folding Nest into its smart-home ecosystem and creating Google Nest means that major changes—some good, some painful—are coming. Here is what you need to know about these changes and what steps you can take.

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U.S News World & Report Smart Home Security Systems Review

I wrote two full guides to security systems Link Interactive and Protect America, as well as interviewed CTOs, CEOs and VPs of security companies for U.S News World & Reports Best Home Security Systems of 2019.

Link Interactive

Protect America

Chris Carney, CEO Abode

Mike Harris, President of Ring Solutions

Syed Zaidi, CEO of Frontpoint

Daniel Roberts, founder and CEO of Scout

Chad Laurans, founder and CEO of SimpliSafe

Erick Low, senior product marketing manager for Nest

Dennis Mathew, vice president and general manager of Xfinity Home

Jeremy Warren, chief technology officer of Vivint Smart Home

All Dwell Articles

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We turned our Alexa house into a Google home for a month – here's what happened - The Ambient

For almost five years now, my family has had a fifth member: Alexa. It's my kids’ buddy, telling them terrible jokes, sharing fart skills, playing Would You Rather and other games. Alexa has become something of a third parent, announcing every night at 7:15pm that there are 15 minutes of screen time left, dimming three lights during story time, and switching them off when the kids are asleep.

It's there in the morning, telling us the weather forecast, what’s on our jam-packed calendar for the day, and occasionally providing the kids with a fun fact to wow their classmates with. It was the only AI my children had ever known. And then it was gone.

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August View Doorbell Camera review

The front door is a coveted spot for smart home companies these days, with seemingly everyone developing their own video doorbell to provide 'visual voicemail' for your home, as well as an always-watching smart security camera.

The convenience and security these devices offer is hard to quibble with, assuming you have an existing wired doorbell to replace. If you don’t, your battery-powered options have been limited. But now there’s a new kid on the block. August’s View is a completely wire-free doorbell camera that lets you know what’s happening at your front door wherever you are by streaming video to your smartphone.

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Casper’s New $89 Lamp Promises to Help You Get a Better Night's Sleep - Dwell.com

Mattress startup Casper introduces a smart lamp designed to promote healthier sleep.

Casper, the company that reinvented how we buy mattresses, now wants to transform our sleep habits with Casper Glow—a new connected bedtime light. The small, cord-free lamp is designed to address a common culprit that can get in the way of a good night’s rest: light.

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How I trained my smart home to be a third parent

My tips for using the connected home with children

“Why would I want a smart home?” It’s a common question as connected devices become more ubiquitous and pressure on “normal people” to start buying internet-enabled products mounts. My answer is always, “Do you have a problem you’d like to solve?” Or, “Do you have kids?”

The smart home is manna from heaven for parents. It is literally the third parent (or second) we’ve been asking for since these tiny bundles of joy burst into our lives. As early as 2016, 70% of parents in the U.S. owned at least one IoT device, and more than a third wanted to buy another one because they believe smart devices make them better parents.

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Smart home companies are turning us all into crime fighters - will it actually work? - The Ambinet

Why turning to social media might not make us safer

In 2015 Ring installed video doorbells in 10% of homes in the Wilshire Park neighborhood as part of a pilot program with the Los Angeles Police Department. According to the company, the LAPD saw a 55% decrease in home break-ins over the following six months. It made for a nice flashy number for Ring to point at, and undoubtedly helped it in its journey to getting snapped up by Amazon, even if there's some debate over the evidence. 

It gave Ring a reason to hone in on the community angle, and now it's venturing into a new crime fighting space – social media. Will sharing what our smart home sees with our neighbors make us safer? Or will it redefine the term nosey neighbor?

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Casper’s New $89 Lamp Promises to Help You Get a Better Night's Sleep - Dwell.com

Mattress startup Casper introduces a smart lamp designed to promote healthier sleep.

Casper, the company that reinvented how we buy mattresses, now wants to transform our sleep habits with Casper Glow—a new connected bedtime light. The small, cord-free lamp is designed to address a common culprit that can get in the way of a good night’s rest: light.

Read the full story here.

10 Home Gadgets at CES 2019: Talking Toilets, Beer-Ordering Fridges, and More - Dwell.com

Sleek design meets smart technology. Innovative solutions produce stylish results. And of course, there are robots and talking toilets.

Held in Las Vegas, Nevada, every January, the annual consumer electronics show CES is where we get a sneak peek at the latest tech gadgets we'll be buying in the next few years, and a glimpse into the future of technology.

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