Thread regarding Sears layoffs

Anyone want an Alfie?

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Post ID: @OP+VZ0bu28

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I have a few that found their way to my hands in December 2016. Within an hour I realized the utter pointlessness of the product. It's nothing new for Sears, a company that comes up with ideas they fail to execute properly and almost always abandon or let languish (mygofer, Shop Your Way Relay, the Shop Your Way "social network," etc.)

Alfie's flaw was that it didn't save anyone time or money. When you asked about a particular item you were looking for, a human would listen to the message and eventually type back to you a frustrating series of questions - one at a time, that had to be answered. It could take DAYS to narrow down something to recommend, and when they did, it was frequently priced significantly higher than the competition. The result: a 5-minute Google search got you a much better deal far faster on your own without bothering with Alfie.

For Alfie to be successful, it needed to give instant responses. Otherwise, you were better off doing your own shopping, which is exactly what most people did.

The whole thing was a colossal waste of money and resources, and I doubt any focus group testing this device would have found it very useful. The final design looked and felt cheap and lacked most of the features any other smart home device offered. It was quickly crushed by the competition and bad implementation.

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Post ID: @cab+VZ0bu28

There are still several third-party sellers on Amazon desperate to get rid of Alfies for $5 with free shipping. https://www.amazon.com/Alfie-Voice-Controlled-Intelligent-Shopper/dp/B01JV7YWHY They've been paperweights since the service was shut down some time in 2017.

Here's a somewhat-amusing article about the Alfie design process, from a guy who worked on it. https://medium.com/@dpolevoy/design-9ae68e6615a7 One interesting point is that the whole 'talk to some guy in India' aspect was supposed to be temporary and it would gradually transition to AI that Sears was supposedly working on, but that never was actually implemented.

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Post ID: @yqx+VZ0bu28

It asks you to donate to the keep Sears alive fund

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Post ID: @zdk+VZ0bu28

I wonder what happens if you try to use it LOL

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Post ID: @byv+VZ0bu28

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