Hit up Kickstarter and you’re bound to find speakers projects in all shapes and forms. Music lovers definitely appreciate good speakers, and while anyone who takes a look at Aether’s Cone is going to appreciate its design, they might be surprised to find out that its actually a lot more than a stylish speaker. This here is the embodiment of Internet of Things, with ample amounts of processing power and complex algorithms, Cone is capable of tapping into a variety of music sources as it functions as a powerful music recommendation engine that learns users’ habits and preferences to play what it believes is music they’ll appreciate.
Cone’s design is certainly a sight for sore eyes. While it is undoubtedly a “smart” speaker, it is not cluttered with buttons, it doesn’t even have a LCD display. There’s a button in the center of the speaker grill which is pressed when a song is to be played, and on top are two buttons for adjusting volume. Once the center button is pressed, Cone chooses a song from the users’ preferred streaming service, and if they wish to hear something else, they can simply spin the front edge of the speaker. This simple action brings up another genre, and can even jump to a different content source. When users want to hear something in particular, they can speak out the name of an artist or track after pressing the center button, or can simply use it as an AirPlay speaker for tracks stored on their iOS devices.
Whenever the front edge is spun, Cone picks up something new about the user. It learns habits and preferences by noting what tracks are skipped and which genres are usually listened to the most. The built-in accelerometer is capable of gauging what the users’ listen to in different rooms, and how the music differences from the previous room. Simplicity is its biggest feature, and the folks at Aether have hit the nail on the head.
Arriving later this summer, Cone will cost $399.
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