Amazon devices chief Panos Panay sees a future where AI devices replace the need to use apps

Amazon is placing its bets on ambient computing, not apps, as the future of personal AI. Alongside the launch of the company’s new AI wearables from Bee, Panos Panay, who serves as Amazon’s SVP of Devices, Alexa & Leo, took the stage at TechCrunch Disrupt on Thursday to talk more in depth about where he sees personal computing headed.

亚马逊正押注于环境计算而非应用程序，将其视为个人人工智能的未来。随着该公司推出全新的 Bee 系列人工智能可穿戴设备，担任亚马逊设备、Alexa 和 Leo 高级副总裁的帕诺斯·帕奈（Panos Panay）周四在 TechCrunch Disrupt 大会上登台，深入探讨了他对个人计算未来发展的看法。

“A lot of times, what you’re doing right now — what we all do right now — is we have to remember what we’re asking our tool to do for us,” Panay began, explaining that this is how we engage with our modern smartphones. “It’s like point, shoot, return,” Panay continued. “I think where we’re headed is a world [that] starts with ambient devices.”

“很多时候，我们现在所做的事情——我们所有人现在都在做的事情——就是我们必须记住我们要求工具为我们做什么，”帕奈开场说道，并解释这就是我们与现代智能手机互动的方式。“这就像是点选、拍摄、返回，”帕奈继续说道。“我认为我们正在走向一个以环境设备为起点的世界。”

By “ambient devices,” he means those that work quietly in the background, using sensors and AI to help you figure out what needs to be done, instead of the other way around, where you’re telling the device what you need to do. “As it works in the background, you’re able to stay more present. You’re able to get more done. You’re about to spend more time with people … you’re not afraid if you miss something. It’s incredibly powerful,” Panay said.

他所说的“环境设备”是指那些在后台静默运行的设备，它们利用传感器和人工智能来帮助你确定需要完成的任务，而不是反过来由你告诉设备你需要做什么。“当它在后台运行时，你能够更加专注于当下。你能完成更多工作。你将有更多时间陪伴他人……你不必担心错过任何事情。这非常强大，”帕奈说。

Amazon’s biggest entry into this space is the set of new Bee devices it introduced on Thursday, which include a band you can wear on your wrist or detach to wear as a pendant, as well as a new credit-card-sized device that attaches magnetically to the back of your smartphone. These gadgets passively record audio and take notes about your day, finding the to-dos, reminders, and insights you may later need to refer back to.

亚马逊进军该领域最大的举措是周四推出的全新 Bee 系列设备，其中包括一款可以戴在手腕上或拆卸下来作为吊坠佩戴的腕带，以及一款可以磁吸在智能手机背面的信用卡大小的新设备。这些小工具会被动地录制音频并记录你一天的生活，找出你以后可能需要参考的待办事项、提醒和见解。

To balance the need to be useful with user privacy, Bee’s devices don’t actually store the raw audio from your conversations; they process the audio in real time and then delete it when done. Transcripts of conversations are encrypted using keys that your device creates and controls. That means no one else, including Amazon employees, can access those files unless you intentionally share them.

为了在实用性和用户隐私之间取得平衡，Bee 设备实际上并不会存储对话的原始音频；它们会实时处理音频，并在处理完成后将其删除。对话转录内容使用由你的设备创建和控制的密钥进行加密。这意味着除了你主动分享外，包括亚马逊员工在内的任何人都无法访问这些文件。

Panay said that privacy was a key consideration for how these new ambient devices should work. “You have to give customers that control,” he said. “Every product is different, but for Bee specifically, as an example in the ambient space like that, you have to design with privacy in mind. And that’s what we do. That’s critical.”

帕奈表示，隐私是这些新型环境设备运作方式的关键考量因素。“你必须赋予客户这种控制权，”他说。“每款产品都不同，但以 Bee 为例，作为环境计算领域的一个例子，你必须在设计时考虑到隐私。而这正是我们所做的。这至关重要。”

The executive, who came to Amazon after 19 years at Microsoft where he oversaw the development of Surface devices, has spent a lot of his life thinking about how personal computing will evolve. With Bee — and ambient computing more generally — Panay also envisioned a future where the idea of interacting with apps becomes less important, as more tasks are handled via AI.

这位高管在微软工作了 19 年，曾负责 Surface 设备的开发，之后加入亚马逊。他一生中花费了大量时间思考个人计算将如何演变。通过 Bee 以及更广泛的环境计算，帕奈还设想了一个未来：随着更多任务通过人工智能处理，与应用程序交互的概念将变得不再那么重要。

“Do I think we have a future where there’s a bit of a balance — a whole generation that doesn’t say ‘give me the app’ for that, but says it should just understand what I need? Yeah, I do. I think that transformation is coming. I think that is the next generation,” he said.

“我认为我们是否会迎来一个平衡的未来——整整一代人不再说‘给我那个应用程序’，而是说它应该直接理解我的需求？是的，我认为会。我认为这种转变即将到来。我认为这就是下一代，”他说。

That doesn’t necessarily mean the smartphone itself won’t continue to be an important personal computing device (as much as Amazon would like it to be an Alexa tablet or Echo smart speaker), Panay pointed out. Rather, he believes a new crop of devices will emerge that use sensors to understand users better, and to bring intelligence to the world around you.

帕奈指出，这并不一定意味着智能手机本身不会继续成为重要的个人计算设备（尽管亚马逊很希望它是 Alexa 平板电脑或 Echo 智能音箱）。相反，他认为将会出现一批新的设备，利用传感器更好地了解用户，并将智能带入你周围的世界。

“I’m not a proponent that says one form factor is going to replace another. I don’t think that’s the case,” he clarified. “I think there’s an intelligence layer that connects it all … and it has to be useful.”

“我并不是那种认为某种外形会取代另一种外形的支持者。我不认为会发生这种情况，”他澄清道。“我认为存在一个连接这一切的智能层……而且它必须是有用的。”