In the networked home of the future, wireless likely will play a major role, connecting family members to their loved ones, music collections and even microwaves. But the long-held vision of a connected home has faced plenty of stumbling blocks along the way, and some in the industry foresee plenty more.
“The state of home networking has never been better,” said Richard Doherty, director of consulting firm Envisioneering Group. However, Doherty pointed out, “it looks better on paper than it actually works.”
Home networks are available today, Doherty said, and equipment for the system is even available at retail outlets like Target. But today’s connected homes meet only the most basic definition, wherein users install a Wi-Fi access point so two computers can share the same telephone line. Thus, Doherty said, home networking is simple, relatively easy to install and available.
“The technology has been there for a number of years,” he said.
But such networked homes are a far cry from what has long been promised. Consumer electronics giants continue to promote a vision of a lavishly connected home, one in which users have pervasive access to the Internet, can command their appliances through the Internet and are able to call up any type of entertainment from the Internet. It’s a grand vision, and it’s one that the wireless industry can enjoy especially since such implementations largely rely on wireless devices and networks.
It’s also a vision that abuts some significant issues.
“What happens when the dishwasher and the washing machine get in a fight?” Doherty joked.
The question gets at some of the most rancorous issues. The dishwasher and washing machine share the same power source, and a networked home likely would require far more juice than traditional homes. California’s recent power shortage highlights the potential difficulties. Further, a fight between the dishwasher and the washing machine could occur over connection issues, as each appliance may use a rival wireless technology. Granted, the two appliances won’t come to blows over network interoperability, but the giant manufacturing companies that build such machines may have more to say in the matter. Indeed, with home networking choices ranging from Bluetooth to Wi-Fi to infrared to WiMAX-the battle could get even more complicated than GSM vs. CDMA.
But those are just the technical issues.
“The technology is ahead of the social issues,” Doherty said.
For example, a homeowner could set up a Wi-Fi network and share access with nearby neighbors. If cable TV and movie content were available on demand through such networks (as they are in many networked-home scenarios) then such sharing likely would raise the ire of cable companies, TV stations, Internet service providers and a host of others. And that’s just one example.
However, such concerns haven’t stopped interested companies from continuing to push the concept of a connected home-and in most cases mobile phones play a primary role in the execution.
For several years the Internet Home Alliance has worked to conduct networked home trials with a variety of companies. Just a few months ago, the group launched its Mealtime Pilot, a collaboration among Whirlpool Corp., IBM Corp., Hewlett-Packard Co. and others. The pilot covers 20 homes in Boston for six months and allows users to program their ovens to store, cook and cool a meal; adjust their ovens using mobile phones; and even receive updates from their ovens over their phones. “Do you still want me to have this dish ready by 7 p.m.?” the oven asks.
Microsoft Corp. too has been active in the area, demonstrating its home-networking technologies at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show. The company’s project, dubbed Aladdin, alerts a user through a mobile phone when a home’s power goes out or when motion alarms are triggered, allows a user to adjust house lights through e-mail messages, and can even send pictures of a visitor at the front door to a phone.
Nokia Corp. late last year announced a deal with Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd. to cooperate on exchanging information between mobile phones and home electronics. The companies promised to allow TV viewers to change channels using their mobile phones, among various other applications. The collaboration includes the use of wireless technologies like multimedia messaging service and Java.
But perhaps the most wide-ranging and innovative project comes from the government of Singapore. The country’s Infocomm Development Authority earlier this year put up $2.6 million for a $9.7 million project that combines several independent networked-home trials. The agency’s Connected Homes program covers 400 families and 30 different applications and includes technologies from Philips Electronics, LG Electronics and Samsung Asia. The effort is perhaps the most extensive and advanced test yet of home-networking systems and includes a variety of wireless technologies.
Such significant efforts, however, come on the heels of years of work in the networked-homes area. And it seems not all efforts have led to commercial success. Struggling telematics provider OnStar conducted a networked home trial in Detroit last year, but so far it has not turned into a commercial service. And interest in the UPnP (Universal Plug ‘n Play) Forum-which is working on home-networking standards-seems to be waning considering the organization has had little news during the past year.
The Envisioneering Group’s Doherty said home networking makes sense for computing functions, allowing multiple users to share the same printer for instance, but said further services may be farther down the road.
