I have read too that the Wink is undependable. I have not purchased one.
An interesting recent snippet from Julie Jacobson of CE Pro...
Note that CE Pro is a trade magazine for professional installers and not really a DIY automation publication.
"Letter from the Editor
Wink, the home automation hub and platform that spun out of GE-backed Quirky, is facing some serious money issues. It turns out: making, selling and supporting a smart-home controller for the mass market is an expensive and otherwise tricky proposition.
Surprise!
We're not hearing such rosy pictures for Staples Connect and Lowe's Iris either. It's all getting way too complicated - from the messaging to the sales process to the implementation -- and we might have already run out of daring early adopters.
Is the Wink news bad for the professional integration business?
I think not.
Integrators know which products to install, how to sell them and how to create a positive user experience for the long term. If only we could get more of them to create a business model for high-volume installs!"
Another Julie quote from just a couple of days ago...
And this disconnect isn’t limited to service providers like the cable companies. Look at Staples Connect, Lowe’s Iris and Quirky’s Wink—none of which seem to be making their backers extremely happy.
While my customer-service experience with Wink a very long time ago was excellent (didn’t solve my issues but there was a lot of good effort), I wondered why in this day and age I had to describe every IP and Z-Wave device on the network, and how it was performing at that moment. And then I personally had to go around plugging, unplugging, pressing buttons, pressing and holding buttons, rebooting ... and describing every action along the way.
This is frustrating for the customer and terribly unprofitable for the provider.
I do see the Wink as an introduction to automation. I do still automate my light switches here rather than my light bulbs; but that is me.
Here playing with the Amazon Echo (Armzilla's Amazon Echo HA bridge) concurrent to my automation that has utilized MS SAPI now for about 15 years. Works for me. I was able to run a the Echo HA bridge on an RPi2 concurrent to automation software). I did get the Amazon Echo a while ago and just stared at the monolith box for months before playing with it.
It is to me just another remote console to my automation with good voice recognition and a bit more.
I am amazed how well the Amazon Echo is working.
Here are some quickie videos of using the Amazon Echo with automation software.
Today there are a couple of ways to integrate the device (that I know of).
1 - Java Amazon Echo Bridge
2 - Lambda function