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https://twitter.com/ppathole/status/1116670170980859905 https://twitter.com/ppathole/status/1116670170980859905 Tech enthusiasts: My entire house is smart.

https://twitter.com/ppathole/status/1116670170980859905 https://twitter.com/ppathole/status/1116670170980859905 Tech enthusiasts: My entire house is smart. Tech workers: The only piece of technology in my house is a printer and I keep a gun next to it so I can shoot it if it makes a noise I don't recognize. The only modification i'd recommend is replacing the gun with something simpler, like a sledgehammer. Can't be too careful.

guestbest 4y ago
Do you think sparks in the primer can be remotely hacked? If so go with a black powder firearm.
cortesoft 4y ago
I don't know, I have been a professional software developer for 15 years, and my whole house is smart. The trade offs are worth it to me.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- phendrenad2 4y ago
  Same here. This joke/meme is cute but it isn't really true, lots of tech people have smart devices.
  - Moru 4y ago
    Some tech enthusiasts just aren't old enough yet to become tech people :-)
- WalterBright 4y ago
  I still have no idea why anyone would want automated light switches. Unless they are bedridden. The conventional light switches never fail. The dimmer switches go out every 5 years or so, and I eventually get fed up and just replace them with a conventional switch. I've had programmable thermostats, but the user interfaces on them are so terrible I eventually replace them with one with a simple dial and thermostat.
  - icoder 4y ago
    If I wake up early with my 3m old son and hit the livingroom switch, various christmas lights turn on. Before that I will have turned on a dim salt lamp in our bedroom with a small butten I have near the bed, as to not wake my gf. I turn it off with the wall switch while leaving the room. The light in the hallway is dim because it is still early. Since he didn't poop I only need a dim light in the changing area operated by my foot. Various lights in the house turn on automatically by movement or door opening. Lights near the front door go on dinly just before subset and get brighter with movement. The wall switch in the kitchen turns on multiple lights including cabinet downlighting. These things and more, and the fact I can change them relatively easily and wihtout rewiring, I find convenient and that brings me value. You don't have to understand though, we both can like different things.
  - deepspace 4y ago
    That is true for some switches made by fly-by-night Silicon Valley companies. Especially the ones that need a Wifi connection to work. The ones I use are made by Lutron, who has a long history of making conventional light switches. They act just like normal switches, and I could sell my house without the home automation system, and it would be perfectly functional for the new owner. Having carefully designs home automation brings lots of little conveniences. When I walk into a room when it is dark, the light automatically turns on. When it becomes cloudy during the day, lights in the darker living areas turn on. When I go to bed, I press one button, and all the lights in the house turn off, and the motion sensors are disabled. Another button press in the morning re-enables the sensors and turns on the lights in all the "morning activity" areas of the house. Bottom line is that I seldom have to press a light switch. I always automagically have light when and where I need it.
    - WalterBright 4y ago
      > Bottom line is that I seldom have to press a light switch I just don't think of it as a burden. I don't think about it at all. My hand goes up to the switch. I know I don't think about it, because when the power goes out my hand still automatically turns the switch on, even when I'm carrying a lamp. There's a second where I blink wonderering why the light didn't go on. I have some 1-watt LED lights plugged in and on all the time, so I don't fall down the stairs. I figure the 1 watt is less than the power draw of motion detectors, etc.
richbell 4y ago
In a similar vein: https://xkcd.com/2030/ https://xkcd.com/2030/
jasonhansel 4y ago
Careful about that printer: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2011/11/hp-printers-can-be-remotely-controlled-and-set-on-fire-researchers-claim/ https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2011/11/hp-pr...
- femto 4y ago
  The question is: whether it would actually trigger the "lp%d on fire" error message? https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git/tree/drivers/char/lp.c?h=linux-6.0.y#n262 https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux...
  - jasonhansel 4y ago
    Obviously the answer is to buy a smart fire extinguisher, so you can remotely put out the flames from your hacked smart printer. Until someone hacks the fire extinguisher and makes it spray chemicals at you. Then you'll need to add a smart fire extinguisher extinguisher.
    - schoen 4y ago
      There was apparently a recurrent Wikipedia hoax based on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radar_detector_detector https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radar_detector_detector where someone asserted that there was a radar detector detector detector (so that you could tell if authorities were positioned to detect your use of a radar detector). Some versions of this hoax are described in https://rationalconspiracy.com/2016/06/02/radar-detector-detector-detector-detector-almost-certainly-a-hoax/ https://rationalconspiracy.com/2016/06/02/radar-detector-det...
      - saiya-jin 4y ago
        we need to go deeper... cat and mouse game running through multiverse
      - Doxin 4y ago
        I mean there's no reason you couldn't build a radar detector detector detector, using the exact same principle a radar detector detector works, just having it detect the heterodyne frequency of the radar detector detector.
phpisthebest 4y ago
As a sysadmin of many decades, I have not owned a printer in 15 years, and no self respecting tech worker I know would ever have one of them in their home. I do have an enterprise grade network, next gen firewall, a homelab, and a host of vlans with home automation segmented off to a dedicated network with zero internet access
- rjzzleep 4y ago
  Brother used to have this HL2030 which worked forever and was dirt cheap. I'd keep one if you could still buy them and if I wasn't travelling them. Doesn't require a host of vlans either. "no self respecting tech worker". But yeah, have fun with your enterprise grade network. Hyperbole much?
  - phpisthebest 4y ago
    It is not hyperbolic, it is retired enterprise equipment I got for a very good price and yes I have great fun with it.
    - tommica 4y ago
      But you're screwed if you need to print something :(
      - phpisthebest 4y ago
        Like what? Everyone should be paperless these days. What exactly do you still need to print?
        californical 4y ago
        Bills need to be mailed to my health insurance company if I want to be reimbursed for anything — no online uploads whatsoever, and this is for one of the major national companies that everyone knows.
razemio 4y ago
Replace this with no cloud device and I am fine with that. I have ALOT of "smart devices". None of them are connected to the cloud. If I want to control my house, I connect to it via VPN. If my house wants to contact me, it uses pushover. Not sure if I will still do this when I am "old" but I might ;).
welder 4y ago
Tech worker here: For real, just use a good password manager with random passwords unique per account. This whole smart vs dumb is moot, tech workers aren't even part of the conversation because we don't get our Yahoo! email accounts hacked.
- kelnos 4y ago
  Also tech worker here: I don't trust any of the smart home vendors to secure either the devices or their cloud services well enough to protect me from someone being able to reach into my home and do stuff. These days I only buy local-network-only devices (mostly Z-Wave) that I connect to a RaspberryPi-based hub, running software I control, with a remote-access component that I control (and secure) as well. At least if someone gets into my smart devices from the outside, I have no one to blame but myself. Unfortunately, this sort of setup is just complicated enough to set up and manage that it's beyond most non-technical (or even moderately-technical) people. I really wish it was easier and more accessible.
  - welder 4y ago
    Actually, you're right I use some exterior smart home things but not any interior cloud based connected devices... except for Google Nest.
TazeTSchnitzel 4y ago
That tweet you linked was plagiarised from: https://twitter.com/rururunit/status/1116412605025935362 https://twitter.com/rururunit/status/1116412605025935362 (I've been on twitter too long and it's given me a sixth sense for detecting clout chasers who just repost others' jokes or make incredibly low-effort tweets.)
- zingmars 4y ago
  That joke is actually pretty old. In fact the link you posted says that it's not his joke. I don't really know where it came from, but it's certainly not from that guy.
- belter 4y ago
  And that one plagiarized from this post one year before...? https://michaelblume.tumblr.com/post/169525456166/tech-enthusiasts-everything-in-my-house-is-wired https://michaelblume.tumblr.com/post/169525456166/tech-enthu... Oh wait..maybe this one copied it from this other one in 2017? https://notcaycepollard.tumblr.com/post/167952829352/tech-enthusiasts-everything-in-my-house-is-wired https://notcaycepollard.tumblr.com/post/167952829352/tech-en... We need a "git blame" for the web? :-)

guestbest 4y ago

Do you think sparks in the primer can be remotely hacked? If so go with a black powder firearm.

cortesoft 4y ago

I don't know, I have been a professional software developer for 15 years, and my whole house is smart. The trade offs are worth it to me.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
phendrenad2 4y ago
Same here. This joke/meme is cute but it isn't really true, lots of tech people have smart devices.
- Moru 4y ago
  Some tech enthusiasts just aren't old enough yet to become tech people :-)
WalterBright 4y ago
I still have no idea why anyone would want automated light switches. Unless they are bedridden. The conventional light switches never fail. The dimmer switches go out every 5 years or so, and I eventually get fed up and just replace them with a conventional switch. I've had programmable thermostats, but the user interfaces on them are so terrible I eventually replace them with one with a simple dial and thermostat.
- icoder 4y ago
  If I wake up early with my 3m old son and hit the livingroom switch, various christmas lights turn on. Before that I will have turned on a dim salt lamp in our bedroom with a small butten I have near the bed, as to not wake my gf. I turn it off with the wall switch while leaving the room. The light in the hallway is dim because it is still early. Since he didn't poop I only need a dim light in the changing area operated by my foot. Various lights in the house turn on automatically by movement or door opening. Lights near the front door go on dinly just before subset and get brighter with movement. The wall switch in the kitchen turns on multiple lights including cabinet downlighting. These things and more, and the fact I can change them relatively easily and wihtout rewiring, I find convenient and that brings me value. You don't have to understand though, we both can like different things.
- deepspace 4y ago
  That is true for some switches made by fly-by-night Silicon Valley companies. Especially the ones that need a Wifi connection to work. The ones I use are made by Lutron, who has a long history of making conventional light switches. They act just like normal switches, and I could sell my house without the home automation system, and it would be perfectly functional for the new owner. Having carefully designs home automation brings lots of little conveniences. When I walk into a room when it is dark, the light automatically turns on. When it becomes cloudy during the day, lights in the darker living areas turn on. When I go to bed, I press one button, and all the lights in the house turn off, and the motion sensors are disabled. Another button press in the morning re-enables the sensors and turns on the lights in all the "morning activity" areas of the house. Bottom line is that I seldom have to press a light switch. I always automagically have light when and where I need it.
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    > Bottom line is that I seldom have to press a light switch I just don't think of it as a burden. I don't think about it at all. My hand goes up to the switch. I know I don't think about it, because when the power goes out my hand still automatically turns the switch on, even when I'm carrying a lamp. There's a second where I blink wonderering why the light didn't go on. I have some 1-watt LED lights plugged in and on all the time, so I don't fall down the stairs. I figure the 1 watt is less than the power draw of motion detectors, etc.

richbell 4y ago

In a similar vein: https://xkcd.com/2030/ https://xkcd.com/2030/

jasonhansel 4y ago

Careful about that printer: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2011/11/hp-printers-can-be-remotely-controlled-and-set-on-fire-researchers-claim/ https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2011/11/hp-pr...

femto 4y ago
The question is: whether it would actually trigger the "lp%d on fire" error message? https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git/tree/drivers/char/lp.c?h=linux-6.0.y#n262 https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux...
- jasonhansel 4y ago
  Obviously the answer is to buy a smart fire extinguisher, so you can remotely put out the flames from your hacked smart printer. Until someone hacks the fire extinguisher and makes it spray chemicals at you. Then you'll need to add a smart fire extinguisher extinguisher.
  - schoen 4y ago
    There was apparently a recurrent Wikipedia hoax based on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radar_detector_detector https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radar_detector_detector where someone asserted that there was a radar detector detector detector (so that you could tell if authorities were positioned to detect your use of a radar detector). Some versions of this hoax are described in https://rationalconspiracy.com/2016/06/02/radar-detector-detector-detector-detector-almost-certainly-a-hoax/ https://rationalconspiracy.com/2016/06/02/radar-detector-det...
    - saiya-jin 4y ago
      we need to go deeper... cat and mouse game running through multiverse
    - Doxin 4y ago
      I mean there's no reason you couldn't build a radar detector detector detector, using the exact same principle a radar detector detector works, just having it detect the heterodyne frequency of the radar detector detector.

phpisthebest 4y ago

As a sysadmin of many decades, I have not owned a printer in 15 years, and no self respecting tech worker I know would ever have one of them in their home. I do have an enterprise grade network, next gen firewall, a homelab, and a host of vlans with home automation segmented off to a dedicated network with zero internet access

rjzzleep 4y ago
Brother used to have this HL2030 which worked forever and was dirt cheap. I'd keep one if you could still buy them and if I wasn't travelling them. Doesn't require a host of vlans either. "no self respecting tech worker". But yeah, have fun with your enterprise grade network. Hyperbole much?
- phpisthebest 4y ago
  It is not hyperbolic, it is retired enterprise equipment I got for a very good price and yes I have great fun with it.
  - tommica 4y ago
    But you're screwed if you need to print something :(
    - phpisthebest 4y ago
      Like what? Everyone should be paperless these days. What exactly do you still need to print?
      - californical 4y ago
        Bills need to be mailed to my health insurance company if I want to be reimbursed for anything — no online uploads whatsoever, and this is for one of the major national companies that everyone knows.

razemio 4y ago

Replace this with no cloud device and I am fine with that. I have ALOT of "smart devices". None of them are connected to the cloud. If I want to control my house, I connect to it via VPN. If my house wants to contact me, it uses pushover. Not sure if I will still do this when I am "old" but I might ;).

welder 4y ago

Tech worker here: For real, just use a good password manager with random passwords unique per account. This whole smart vs dumb is moot, tech workers aren't even part of the conversation because we don't get our Yahoo! email accounts hacked.

kelnos 4y ago
Also tech worker here: I don't trust any of the smart home vendors to secure either the devices or their cloud services well enough to protect me from someone being able to reach into my home and do stuff. These days I only buy local-network-only devices (mostly Z-Wave) that I connect to a RaspberryPi-based hub, running software I control, with a remote-access component that I control (and secure) as well. At least if someone gets into my smart devices from the outside, I have no one to blame but myself. Unfortunately, this sort of setup is just complicated enough to set up and manage that it's beyond most non-technical (or even moderately-technical) people. I really wish it was easier and more accessible.
- welder 4y ago
  Actually, you're right I use some exterior smart home things but not any interior cloud based connected devices... except for Google Nest.

TazeTSchnitzel 4y ago

That tweet you linked was plagiarised from: https://twitter.com/rururunit/status/1116412605025935362 https://twitter.com/rururunit/status/1116412605025935362 (I've been on twitter too long and it's given me a sixth sense for detecting clout chasers who just repost others' jokes or make incredibly low-effort tweets.)

zingmars 4y ago
That joke is actually pretty old. In fact the link you posted says that it's not his joke. I don't really know where it came from, but it's certainly not from that guy.
belter 4y ago
And that one plagiarized from this post one year before...? https://michaelblume.tumblr.com/post/169525456166/tech-enthusiasts-everything-in-my-house-is-wired https://michaelblume.tumblr.com/post/169525456166/tech-enthu... Oh wait..maybe this one copied it from this other one in 2017? https://notcaycepollard.tumblr.com/post/167952829352/tech-enthusiasts-everything-in-my-house-is-wired https://notcaycepollard.tumblr.com/post/167952829352/tech-en... We need a "git blame" for the web? :-)