First off, myself and my family use voice control pretty frequently. I’m sure the developers have access to Nabu Casa Alexa skill and google statistics, so they can tell how much people are using devices through voice. I have quite a few automations and have added more over the years, but voice control to me is still important. I know many on here can automate everything to the point they don’t need voice control, touch a switch, or use an app, but I just can’t get that far and I think most users at some point will need interaction with their systems.
As far as voice control, I have several Alexa’s. As an alternative, I’ve used Home Intent -
It runs in docker, locally of course, is built on Rhasspy, and can be used for voice control of Home Assistant. It was a neat alternative to Alexa, and did work with Home Assistant for device control through voice. Ultimately though, the developer has stopped updating it and i don’t think it really caught on.
In the end, I stopped using it since I didn’t want to install a machine with a microphone in place of every Alexa device I have in the house. Also, the bearer token to control Home Assistant is exposed on the LAN in an un-secured web page that can be accessed without any auth (I’m sure I can put it behind a proxy or something if I wanted it more secure)
Like posters above, I think proper hardware would be the main stumbling block of moving forward with local voice control. I’m not really sure of hardware alternatives that could somehow integrate with Home Assistant - RPI’s with microphones in place of Alexa probably aren’t an option right now given the fact the RPI is so expensive and hard to find.
That being said, I’m definitely excited about this project and am glad to see it move forward. I’m not sure about the future of Alexa and other voice assistants, and companies are quick to discard unprofitable products and have no problem leaving their users out in the cold (Iris, wink, insteon, etc). I would definitely be willing to pay more for a device that isn’t trying to sell me something or is cloud dependent if it’s out there. Homeassistant sort of got into the business of hardware with Homeassistant yellow. Maybe a Homeassistant smart speaker?