3 ms·

Is the smart home really failing? Reading the article I realised I actually have plenty of "smart" home products. The catch is that they are not really smart

Is the smart home really failing? Reading the article I realised I actually have plenty of "smart" home products. The catch is that they are not really smart but I like what they do. Small lamps which I can switch on and off directly from my phone without having to go through the room are nice. Being able to make the light warmer when I want is nice too. I have a smart thermostat which I motly use to warm my place the day before I get there when I am out for a long time. That's pretty enjoyable too. My scale graphs my weight automatically when I remember to use its "smart" feature. When I was paying attention to it, it was handy. I also like the fact that it's all piloted from my phone which I mostly always have and apart from the thermostat none of them require being online. At this point, the smartness is mostly just remote control and sometimes a feedback loop with a sensor. That's not very smart but I don't really need more.

FooHentai 5y ago
Sounds like discretionary adoption along the lines of a typical hype curve based on what you describe;- Initial optimism about a hyper integrated, seamless home full of intelligent devices that sync up and act as a cohesive whole. This gives way to eventually settling on reality where a few disparate clever devices deliver high value while being relatively low complexity and working mostly independently. I've struggled to find even that much value in smart products - we flirted with a Hue system but at literally 10x the cost of ordinary led lights we didn't get beyond a few bulbs before realizing it was a money pit with at best marginal benefits. We have a few nice nanoleaf feature pieces that run themselves on a simple schedule. I can't see much else making it's way into the place and creating additional headaches. I felt like a cynical old git shaking my head about new the work coffee machine having a touch screen and needing wifi to work, but seeing how often the same machine was 'down' waiting for a tech and the absurdity of colleagues who didn't quite know how to work around such an outage... This kind of stuff may be creating value for investors somewhere but in the long run there's little chance it's improving the lives of those it's being marketed to.

FooHentai 5y ago

Sounds like discretionary adoption along the lines of a typical hype curve based on what you describe;- Initial optimism about a hyper integrated, seamless home full of intelligent devices that sync up and act as a cohesive whole. This gives way to eventually settling on reality where a few disparate clever devices deliver high value while being relatively low complexity and working mostly independently. I've struggled to find even that much value in smart products - we flirted with a Hue system but at literally 10x the cost of ordinary led lights we didn't get beyond a few bulbs before realizing it was a money pit with at best marginal benefits. We have a few nice nanoleaf feature pieces that run themselves on a simple schedule. I can't see much else making it's way into the place and creating additional headaches. I felt like a cynical old git shaking my head about new the work coffee machine having a touch screen and needing wifi to work, but seeing how often the same machine was 'down' waiting for a tech and the absurdity of colleagues who didn't quite know how to work around such an outage... This kind of stuff may be creating value for investors somewhere but in the long run there's little chance it's improving the lives of those it's being marketed to.