I'm not being flippant but how else would or should I control my smart plugs and lights? Or set a timer with a voice command? Get my devices set up for "movie time" or control music ?

I paid for the Mycroft and that was a flop and they are now out of business.

Using an app is kind of a shitty interface for that type of thing. Even if I managed to do the rain dance to get home assistant up and running with my stuff...

Because being a tech worker doesn't mean you have privacy concerns, after all someone made those privacy intruding devices