The notion of "smart systems," in which everyday devices are able to collect, process, and apply data to perform tasks better and more automatically, has been around for at least a century. One image that springs to mind is The Jetsons, an animated sitcom that debuted in 1962 and predicted that by 2062 our lives would be enriched by housekeeping robots, automated grooming, and of course, flying cars.
Many Jetsons-predicted technologies, such as tanning beds, talking alarm clocks, and "tele-viewers," have become a reality. And while cars still remain earthbound, they are getting smarter all the time, helping us better navigate, optimizing fuel efficiency, and even doing the driving themselves.
The Pew Internet & American Life project, which examines online attitudes and trends shaping America and the world, recently took a close look at smart systems. Starting with the notion of the "smart home" then expanding to encompass other data-driven applications, the research provides insight into smart systems' reality and potential.
Pew surveyed a group of 1,000 technology experts, observers, and critics about smart systems. The findings were recently published in the report "The Future of Smart Systems," which reveals that 51 percent of those surveyed agreed that by 2020, the connected household will have "become a model of efficiency... thanks to what is known as 'smart systems.' "
However, 46 percent agreed with the opposite statement: "By 2020, most initiatives to embed IP-enabled devices in the home have failed... as a result, the home of 2020 looks about the same as the home of 2011..." Reasons given for this less-rosy view of the future include economic barriers, ease of use and privacy concerns, a lack of standards for development and interoperability, and complexity of design.
Despite the roadblocks, respondents to Pew’s survey also revealed the many ways in which smart systems are already at work. As one survey respondent wrote, "Smart systems are already a major part of our lives (in our cars, for instance), whether we know it or not." Another pointed to increasing adoption of Internet-based entertainment systems as an indicator that our homes are already getting smarter.
Where the greatest opportunities lie, according to respondents, are in smart systems that increase energy efficiency and improve healthcare outside the home.
The Pew report highlights some of the smart projects already underway:
IBM's Smarter Planet initiative already boasts more than 2,000 projects. These include one in Dubuque, Iowa, where IBM is working with the local government to use sensors, software, and Internet computing to improve the city's use of water, electricity, and transportation.
General Electric is working on a prototype of a smart hospital room (announced a couple of years ago)
that is equipped with cameras and analysis software to monitor staff activity. The room records things like whether nurses and aides have failed to wash their hands after touching a patient. Computer vision software is being designed to analyze patients' facial expressions and alert staff if they appear in distress.
A Dutch company called Sparked implants sensors in the ears of cattle to monitor their location, health, eating habits, and response to environmental factors.
These are all examples of how intelligence at work in smart systems seems to work best when it is nearly invisible. Pew's report makes clear that standardized, easy-to-use technologies that genuinely improve our quality of life while blending into the everyday environment will be advances we'll all want to live with.
— Michelle Manafy writes for a variety of publications with a focus on emerging trends in digital content and how they shape successful business practices.
Michelle, very timely article. I do agree that people value the home itself, in today's economy, but the reality of smarter management of energy use, access to health resources, etc., are clearly becoming more intuitive applications of technology to extend services to the consumer.
As you point out, we are increasingly relying on smart systems, from our brakes to our cruise control and onboard alerts. The utility companies are using smart meters to manage our home energy use. Healthcare is increasingly looking at telehealth. All of this suggests a technology system that relys on sensors, data, and "smart systems".
Final thought. I think your point about the smart phones is right on target. The widespread acceptance and desire to access technology through smartphones will, I believe, advance its use as a natural course.
@jabailo - really nice article! Too bad your article is still relevant and that we're still talking about things to come in the future. You should give yourself credit for an extra year of prescience -- the article shows a date of July/August 1993.
In many ways, what we're discussing is a return to the technology goals of the 1960s, the Jetsons as the article says, where "computers" weren't these things that take up your desk space, but are pervasive, omnipresent.
@jabailo - I would love to buy a system that save me from driving back home to make sure that I shut the garage door (happens about once a week) or a refrigerator that communicates with the grocery store so that I can just drive thru and pick up a bag filled with everything i need. BTW research.microsoft.com has a ton of research papers and tutorials on pervasive and ubiquitous computing.
Yes, my friend has an iPhone and Apple home entertainment and right now, he can search for songs on the phone and then with a flick of the wrist throw them on to the full home entertainment system.
So you've got the ideas of the Pervasive System where things like smart metering. These operate like a burglar alarm system...detect motion, presense in the room, and talk to a back end system.
Then we have the Magic Wand or the smartphone type device I can carry with me and ask questions, make commands with voice or gesture.
These things do exist...I think it's more a matter of getting the whole SOA (services oriented architecture) developers working at Amana and Westinghouse to get it all nice and interfaced for the consumer, but also, have the back end systems in place so there is that value added when they switch it on.
Interesting and thoughtful comment, thanks. I wonder too, if the mobile phone is a major tipping-point factor here as well. It has increased our access and use of "smart data" exponentially. And when you tie it into access to, well, a multitude of devices (such as starting your car or turning on your home alarm), the systems are certainly getting smarter. In many ways, I think that consumers are using these smart systems already and the only way they will is if the technology is nearly invisible. People like things to work better, but they don't neccessarily want to be aware of how it is getting done. Who wants a mainframe when a phone is so much less daunting?
When you think about the idea of a PC in every home -- the 1993 PC as a standalone independent device -- it was a collosal failure. Back then the personal computer which costs the price of a used car, was about as well used in the home as the average exercise machine...not at all.
Enter networking and access to a world of information, and suddenly as prices plunged, the device became orders of magnitude more useful.
Contrast the PC style of personal finance: I get my check book, and painstakingly enter each and every transaction into Quicken.
Now the web style: I log in to my Chase account and am able to see and categorize all my transactions, send money for free and request a loan.
This is why I think the Smart Home is far more likely to take off in the next few years than not...the key is pervasive networks, but also new input devices like touch screens and motion and gesture sensors. The deal is that like a business, if a home adds technology it has to gain leverage...not add work, the way a standalone PC did.
With pervasive networks like Wifi and Wimax, every device has a standard interface to the grid...but so what? What's really needed is a way for the manufacturer or 3rd party to enhance the value of the device with information. The classic case is the refrigerator. Sure, maybe it can use motion and vision sensors to tell you what's inside it...but how about also telling you when something is about to expire? How about telling you what recipies can be made without you having to go to the store? And how about a self-restocking refrigerator that connects to Amazon and sends the buy signal when it's the optimal price point to order more food?
See, I think in some sense we've been spinning our wheels with these technologies since the 1970s, when the vision of the future was a gigantic mainframe doing it all for us behind the scenes...but really what was missing was building not just the physical networks, but the services and applications interfaces and networks so programs could talk to each other -- machine to machine communication. Do that, and people might have a reason to spend $50 extra for a refrigerator with a web service in it...
I think privacy and security will always be a concern with any new technology. Be it computers or internet or social media or smart systems. Yet, people will still use these new technologies. I don't think there can ever be any technology that's perfectly safe and has no privacy issues.
Just a feeling on my part that the "smart home" concept might very well be this generation's over-reaching unrealistic view of the future. Every generation/age/decade seems to have one, something which when you look back you say - what ever were they thinking? They being tech experts or even worse futurologists, the closest this age has to alchemists or a pseudo-science.
A good deal of the "smart home" depends on new construction something which currently is very much lagging and moreover requires open minded "smart home dwellers" which if you take a ride outside of your city limits you will find are shockingly non existent.
The ThinkerNet does not reflect the views of TechWeb. The ThinkerNet is an informal means of communication to members and visitors of the Internet Evolution site. Individual authors are chosen by Internet Evolution to blog. Neither Internet Evolution nor TechWeb assume responsibility for comments, claims, or opinions made by authors and ThinkerNet bloggers. They are no substitute for your own research and should not be relied upon for trading or any other purpose.
People's propensity to freely share a wealth of data online through blogs, social networks, professional networks, groups, and many other channels has created a precarious balance between online openness and privacy. While it is exciting when Netflix holds a competition to build a better predictive movie-preference engine, it is concerning when such an event demonstrates how even anonymized data can reveal the people behind it through pattern analysis.
Once just an IT problem, the importance of securing an organization's information assets has climbed the corporate ladder. While IT departments may man the front lines of the security battle, organizations are increasingly taking a high-level strategic approach to information governance.
You can't travel two clicks online without someone extolling the virtues of social networking for marketing, sales, recruiting, and overall information sharing. But opinions are mixed about the usefulness of social networking inside the enterprise.
As if there weren't already enough security threats to be reckoned with, social networks and Internet mobility have formed a perfect union of opportunity for cybercriminals.
New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority is conducting a pilot test of digital kiosks to guide subway users to where they want to go more efficiently and at lower cost.
The whole Amazon.reader debate is a double-stupid. It's stupid to think that there's any e-book buyer who doesn't know Amazon's URL, and it was stupider to let ICANN launch the whole free-form TLD initiative to start with.
While NFC's original goal was to enhance mobile commerce applications, it is finding its way into a number of other uses, which is creating both opportunity as well as challenges for IT departments.
Enterprises would like to move to cloud computing but are hesitant because they are concerned about providers’ ability to secure company data. Here are some tips that help to ensure that if breaches occur, the business is not left holding the bag.
Edmunds separates customers into segments based on the info it collects on its site and from partners, and uses that to push out custom content, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
The automotive website uses propensity modeling to target ads and customer registration forms, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
Expert Integrated Systems: Changing the Experience & Economics of IT In this e-book, we take an in-depth look at these expert integrated systems -- what they are, how they work, and how they have the potential to help CIOs achieve dramatic savings while restoring IT's role as business innovator. READ THIS eBOOK
your weekly update of news, analysis, and
opinion from Internet Evolution - FREE! REGISTER HERE
Wanted! Site Moderators Internet Evolution is looking for a handful of readers to help moderate the message boards on our site – as well as engaging in high-IQ conversation with the industry mavens on our thinkerNet blogosphere. The job comes with various perks, bags of kudos, and GIANT bragging rights. Interested?
To save this item to your list of favorite Internet Evolution content so you can find it later in your Profile page, click the "Save It" button next to the item.
Email This
