NetworkedAppliances

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Existing appliances that might someday be, with value, connected to a computer network (i.e. using USB or Wi-Fi port), not an additional appliance used to use the Internet. The idea of NetworkedAppliances has been floated many times over the last 10 years. Most appliances mentioned were kitchen appliances, and to my mind, much of it is bunk.

There's two things that would make it worthwhile to network an appliance; InformationPresentation? and MeaningfulRemoteControl?. If there is no meaningful way to control an item from a network, and it in no way provides information to a use, adding network information is more or less absurd.

AbsurdNetworkedAppliances?

A canonical example of this would be a toaster. A toaster creates heat, which is not so good to combine with computer technology. A toaster creates heat, and things that create heat should not be controlled in a way where the user can't tell if something is burning. I suspect that someone in marketing heard of VideoToaster?s connected to computers.

PotentialNetworkedAppliances?

Ovens contain timers, so you can cook something for so many minutes. Same with microwaves. Clock alignment is a problem, and networking computers and having them check a time server solves it. I believe that we put clocks on too many things, but one or two of them, in places that are useful are not a problem.

Beyond that, the refrigerator tends to collect childrens' art, magnets, cartoons, newspaper columns and the like. As it often becomes a communication center for the house, so making it networked makes some sort of sense. (Since it comes straight in with built-in cooling, it's a natural for overclocking.)

ObviousNetworkAppliances?

The one thing that obviously needs clock-orientation and remote control is the coffeemaker. This is a device that allows you to prepare it to go, set it up and have it wake you in the morning. This is a device that could work easily with crontab, or with some scheduler to adapt to a non-periodic waking schedule, and also, since it anchors the wakeup schedule of so many people, it requires accurate time. It, more than anything short of the alarm clock, also needs to run off a UPS.

(Not that this is often found in the kitchen, but) a VCR, or a TiVo, would be great for networking. "I won't be able to get home in time for 'Friends'. I'll telnet in and have it taped...."

A key idea in networking is the difference between intelligence and knowledge. Appliances sometimes don't need a lot of intelligence but they do need to know what is going on. A network is what transfers knowledge around.

Sometimes they act as information sources, too. As a poorly-thought-out example, perhaps the toaster ought to tell other appliances when it is active, eg to help smooth out power consumption surges. Actually one can imagine a kind of household market place for electrical power, with appliances bidding against each other. So low-urgency devices like the washing machine would pause when the toaster comes on, or switch off altogether when there is a powercut to prevent draining the UPS.

External links

Siemens is releasing a cellphone in the shape of a pen shortly that will not only record and dial phone numbers as you write them ... with pen strokes. If you combine the pen stroke character detection with LocativeMedia?, you could scribble HangingData? wherever you want--including in the air--with just a pen. Combined with a display (perhaps based on a LaserProjector?), that is something I would want, as I could use it. -- SunirShah

CategoryPervasiveComputing

NetworkedAppliances

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