Why the smart home bubble popped

I suppose that it does make some things less frustrating.

The days when I'd come home from work and see that the porch light got left on all day or find that the pantry light has been left on for hours are all behind me. That's not as important (money-wise) with LEDs as it was with incandescents, but it's good.

It's also fun -- for me, at least -- to think of ways to automate things.

Like: I have a bedroom that tends to get hot on sunny days and overlooks a busy road, and I don't like feeling like I'm on display. So I'd like those blinds closed at night, and open during the day. Sounds simple. I can do that the old fashioned way by opening and closing the blinds with my hands.

Except: If it's hot in there, then maybe they can just stay closed during the day.

Except: Maybe I can let ambient daylight in, and only close the blinds during the day during times when the position of the sun allows for direct sunlight to pour in.

Except: If it's cold in the room and it's during the heating season, then that sunlight is useful energy that saves me money and they should stay open.

Perhaps I could manage all that myself manually every day (and maybe I'll remember to try to get it right, or maybe I won't bother trying at all), or I can code something up one time that does it for me. The latter might not actually be less work, but it's more fun and it's probably going to be more reliable than I am myself.

But this seems not to be a well-advertised way of doing things, unfortunately.

Few verticals outside of video storage could support a monthly subscription putting negative pressure on supporting a shipped product.

Most smart home products are anti-social and had a low k-factor. You don’t want to share access to your scale to more than a handful (2?) people. This makes market adoption slower than a social networking app.

Touched on in the video but median shelf life for these $200 products is 8 years. Thats very “bad” relative to most other consumer hardware. Especially say a $1500 smartphone that’s replaced every 2 years.

Actuation rates on many categories are abysmal. Your smart smoke detector may go years without sending you a message. Compare to say screentime for ChatGPT on mobile averaging hours per day.

Interestingly a lot of those floundering smart home products became thriving businesses when pivoting to smart office focus. Subscriptions go up, user counts go up, utility goes up.