[...] a car that snoops on you and a fridge full of adverts: the perils of the internet of things

[Ron Obvious]

This article exactly articulates my views about "The Internet of Things" which the marketeers are determined to shove down our throat. It promises marginal benefits at best, and real and serious risks. I don't even want a smart TV, and certainly not one with a camera in it.

Hacked dog, a car that snoops on you and a fridge full of adverts: the perils of the internet of things

In the not so distant future, every object in your life will be online and talking to one another. It’ll transform the way we live and work - but will the benefits outweigh the dangers?

If we think of today’s internet metaphorically as about the size of a golf ball, tomorrow’s will be the size of the sun. Within the coming years, not only will every computer, phone and tablet be online, but so too will every car, house, dog, bridge, tunnel, cup, clock, watch, pacemaker, cow, streetlight, bridge, tunnel, pipeline, toy and soda can. Though in 2013 there were only 13bn online devices, Cisco Systems has estimated that by 2020 there will be 50bn things connected to the internet, with room for exponential growth thereafter. As all of these devices come online and begin sharing data, they will bring with them massive improvements in logistics, employee efficiency, energy consumption, customer service and personal productivity.

This is the promise of the internet of things (IoT), a rapidly emerging new paradigm of computing that, when it takes off, may very well change the world we live in forever.

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/mar/11/internet-of-things-hacked-online-perils-future#comments

I just noticed Stallman wrote a comment below the line. He's generally spot on in these matters.

[Newest Reality]

1. Just wondering what the next

thing will be after that to improve efficiency some more and then, rinse and repeat until we are so efficient that everything is getting done two years in advance and then we will need the Universe of Things to allow us to get everything done before we were ever a species and on, and on, ad nauseum.

And then we will probably end up back where we started because everyone will be so sick of it we will set the reality controls to "primitive" and find ourselves in a hyper-real, virtual tribe existence to start the whole darn thing over again.

Hey, things change. Lets accelerate that! Let's change things because things change and let's change them faster and more frequently so that it will increase the amount of micro-transactions that neo-liberalism needs to continue and we will call that progress, if not overkill.

[pinboy3niner]

2. Takes "Be sure to drink your Ovaltine" to a whole new level

[Number23]

3. Doesn't look like only marginal benefits to me

Things that used to make sense suddenly won’t, such as smoke detectors. Why do most smoke detectors do nothing more than make loud beeps if your life is in mortal danger because of fire? In the future, they will flash your bedroom lights to wake you, turn on your home stereo, play an MP3 audio file that loudly warns, “Fire, fire, fire.” They will also contact the fire department, call your neighbours (in case you are unconscious and in need of help), and automatically shut off flow to the gas appliances in the house.

As with all things new, the danger to invasions of privacy and what happens if these items malfunction are there. But the benefits could be huge as well.

[Ron Obvious]

4. My home security system already does that.

Our smoke detectors are integrated into our home security system which is monitored by a service.

Just think of all the false alarms with these things if they contact the Fire department autonomously.

[LeftyMom]

6. Wait until you burn dinner. nt

[hatrack]

5. Yeah, let's devote countless dollars and hours to a Coke can that tracks how quickly you drink

Pay no attention to filthy water, carcinogenic air, collapsing ice shelves and battery-acid oceans.

Look! Over there! Digital Kim Kardashian - and she's dancing on my shower curtain!!!

[olddots]

7. The plastic bags in the oceans were a convenience