> and with the always-listening device, rather dystopian. But that’s what you have assuming you have any modern smart phone.
That feels a little bit of muddling the waters. At least on Android with which I'm familiar, (a) you can turn off the "OK Google" detection in settings so that it's not always listening (and I'm not sure what the setup is now but originally I had to opt it to OK Google detection) and (b) the path for OK Google detection runs on a lower power, on device chip that only has capacity to store like the last few seconds of ambient noise to look for the assistant key phrase.
Agreed, plus it ignores all the commentary making a fuss about phones listening, even here on HN.
Just because it's a losing battle doesn't mean nobody cares.