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Connecting the Echo to Internet-enabled lightbulbs and thermostats made by other companies hadn’t been a focus within Lab126 until late 2014. On a lark, an engineer had rigged the speaker to work as a voice controller for a streaming TV device. It was a forehead-slapping moment for Bezos, according to one employee who worked with him directly. “It was something he grew to embrace, aggressively,” the person said. Amazon’s vision for the Echo now relies heavily on the speaker serving as a hub for the so-called smart home. Limp jokes that it’s only a matter of time before some enterprising developer writes a program to use the Echo’s voice controls to flush the toilet. - www.bloomberg.com