This week, TelecomsTech has an op-ed on why the smart home may never be a smart decision, and on that topic, Heatmiser’s WiFi thermostat becomes the latest smart home product to suffer a high profile security flaw. Similarly, Computer World tells us why the IoT may never happen, and Gigaom takes a look at the long road to the truly smart home. Also, Entrepreneur writes why the investment potential of the IoT may be overblown.
Ars Technica have an interview with the man behind Philip’s Hue light bulbs, and Amazon has a secret smart home and wearables lab. Chinese white goods manufacturer Haier unveiled new additions to its U+ connected home range, Insteon adds Microsoft’s Cortana for voice control in smart home, Pocket Lint looks at smart home cameras, DLink’s walled garden approach to the smart home gets a negative review, and CNET looks at the unconventional Mother home automation kit.
Also, in what could be a pretty significant test case, Comcast is being sued after its home automation and security service didn’t prevent a brutal home invasion. Comcast’s contract waives all liability if its system doesn’t work, which led the attorney to say that if that argument is to be accepted in court, they could simply have installed empty black boxes.
This is a stick for blind people that gathers crowd-sourced data to map environments, and here’s an early look at Mota’s new smart glasses. Pebble, the first “proper” smart watch has dropped its starting price to $99 and added fitness apps, Basis enters the smart watch arena with its Misfit, and Pavlok’s electro-shock wristband is the first Pavlovian wearable.
Ford adds Siri integration to its Microsoft SYNC connected car platform with help from Automation Labs, adding fuel to the rumors that Ford is planning to ditch Microsoft in favor of Blackberry’s QNX software, and Freescale has partnered with Japan’s ALPS to produce 3 automotive connectivity modules. In other automotive IoT news, Spansion is launching a microcontroller for the connected car, Nvidia’s Tegra K1 is now powering Honda’s IVI systems, and this is a look at the potentially Orwellian growth of car-finance ignition blockers, used by banks to block access to cars for those who miss payments. There is already a considerable media backlash to the practice, which looks fine on paper until you see that many of the loans in question were sub-prime – showing the mildly dystopian potential for IoT in the consumer sphere. Oh, and Verizon hits back at the accusation that AT&T is leaving it behind in the connected car game.
The smart grid storage issue appears to have gotten a significant boost by a technique that converts solar power into easy-to-store hydrogen, and Ericsson has acquired bankrupt Ambient, but researchers have hacked a smart meter to cause blackouts and power fraud – so not all good news for the smart grid. Chesapeake Crescent Initiative has picked Newark, Delaware as the location of a smart city pilot program, Itron is collaborating with DTE Energy for a smart city project in Detroit, and would automated gasoline cars be greener than electric vehicles?
Here are 8 key open source IoT projects according to eWeek, The Google Maps-esque IoT search engine Thingful has launched an upgrade to its beta platform, and the Atlantic has a great article on the ways that owning smart and dumb tech differ and the ramifications of traditional ownership in the IoT age – When Everything Works Like Your Cell Phone.