171–180 of 266 posts
I work at a market research/consulting firm that specializes in the embedded devices market. This means we cover any semi-specialized device with a CPU that is not a desktop, laptop, or tablet. The consumer-facing home IoT stuff (Nest, smart-fridge, smart-car etc.) gets a lot of press because it's exciting and it appeals to the least common denominator - anyone from an electrical engineer to a nanny can see how these…
I just bought a home, and just started a considerable renovation. I'm putting in new water pipes, new electrical wiring, etc. I thought of putting "smart" devices (i.e. switches, alarms, thermostats, etc.) given the "advantages" these promise. After considerable research, it's not worth the hussle or money. Let's put aside the fact that these are considerable more expensive, and won't breakeven in years (some devices…
I just bought a home, and just started a considerable renovation. I'm putting in new water pipes, new electrical wiring, etc. I thought of putting "smart" devices (i.e. switches, alarms, thermostats, etc.) given the "advantages" these promise. After considerable research, it's not worth the hussle or money. Let's put aside the fact that these are considerable more expensive, and won't breakeven in years (some devices…
Internet-enabled house jewelry? Feh. It will be fun for a week, then boring. Here's what I want: stuff that will make me a better neighbor and citizen of the world. Specifically: Realtime smart energy and water consumption meters. Wouldn't it be great to get some sort of alert if there was a pipe burst or even a water trickle? Wouldn't it be fabulous to track electricity consumption? That could generate the creation…
The other thing is...your carbon footprint is impacted much more by buying goods that are shipped from overseas, taking trips in airplanes, and the unseen costs of all the products in your life than it is from the relatively small consumption of your home's water & electricity.
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I've started working on exactly this problem. I don't think that sticking everything to a specific vendor is the right solution, and hoping that everybody is going to adopt the same standard is just not going to happen. I'm building a simple open source API that will connect all your devices together regardless of whether they have a fancy API or not. [1] I just started working on it so it's definitely far from done,…
It always concerns me when a programmer reads a customer problem and offers a technical solution. It could be that an open-source API really will solve the problems he mentioned, but if you want adoption, you'll need to get better at explaining how they customer's life is going to get better. If I say, "X is too much hassle" and someone replies with "Good news, I put a bunch of PHP up on Github", I'm not seeing less…
The beta API someone threw up on github obviously isn't going to help the average consumer, but it might be the start of a community of enthusiasts. Maybe one day those enthusiasts build a robust system with wider adoption and a company behind it.
If you want something that 'just works', then github is probably not the first place you should look.
I went to an Internet of Things meeting in SF about two years ago, and it was about like this. A Samsung executive was touting an Internet-enabled refrigerator, which was basically just a refrigerator with a tablet built into the door, with no special sensors, costing more than a refrigerator plus a tablet. I asked him why they'd built the product, and got an honest answer. He said the market was three types of peopl…
For made at home items and non-tagged items, they could also make RFID stickies, where you scan them when you put the item in the fridge, give it a name or take a snapshot with the built-in camera, set your own expiration date, and it tracks how long it's been in there.
If you focused enough on usability, you could make the whole thing feel streamlined and natural. The fridge itself could dispense the RFID tags, and you could just reuse them by reloading it with the old ones, for example.
Commentary about the silliness of the avalanche of IOT devices being created right now aside (99% of consumer internet startups are based on dumb ideas and fail, but that doesn't mean there is no market or trend!), it's inevitable that this stuff is going to get traction in the market and it's a vast market. I doubt it's going to happen based on a bunch of edge-case $99 devices though. The big trend here is the cost…
Well here is an interesting argument for voice control: it's more hygienic. All touch points are potential sources for disease. On the other hand, maybe we are increasing allergies by making the environment too sterile. What hygienic technology will replace touch screens?
Still waiting for waterproofing to become a standard smartphone feature. Then we can start debating handwashing vs dishwashing, and also use the phone to record the washing cycle on video from inside the dishwasher.
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I'm cynica that will be the case. On the Internet TV front we have roku, apple tv, chrome cast, kindle fire TV-- all of them empty plastic boxes doing nearly the same exact thing, and yet there is no interop to speak of. It's just more walled gardens
I've been considering replacing my media PC with a Roku, so I'm curious why you would call them "empty plastic boxes" considering the Roku can stream from my local server and I block all outbound requests at my router (firewall). The advantage I see is the 5W power draw vs. my current 20W. I'm also unclear on what interoperability would mean for one of these devices. I don't think 2 Roku on the same network have any…
Install some linux distribution (I use OpenELEC) that boots into Kodi (formerly xbmc).
Seriously. No proprietary thing I have ever seen matches the features and usability of Kodi. It's an amazing piece of open-source software.