Podcast: Play in new window | Download (8.8MB)
BLOCKBUSTER Total Access click to activate coupon for $10 off your first month.
 |
|
SDR News is a Daily (M-F) Technology Podcast with Tech News Highlights from Slashdot, Digg and Reddit
Click Here to Sign Up for the SDR Newsletter
Prefer a Direct Download ? (mp3)
Download today’s show.
If a news item has disappeared from the Del.icio.us list above, try the full list here.
Thumbnail Views: Via Thumblicio.us
SEARCH ANY STORY YOU HEAR ON THE PODCAST
Network of Everything
by Andrew McCaskey
You Might Want to Think This Through
The Network of Everything describes a not too distant future where everything and everyone has multiple IP enabled devices in a “PN” or personal network that interfaces with the PN’s of family, friends, colleagues and society. It’s been a topic on SDRNews several times, and is featured in a detailed article at Science Daily
It quite frankly gives me the creeps.
As novel as it is to have household applicances reporting their health to heating contractors while stoves, toasters, coffeepots and while other nodes on the network link to RFID chips in prescription drug pillbottles in the medicine cabinet, I think we better pause, and take a long breath.
First, a note of healthy skepticism: This pile of goods is unlikely to work – as in work well together – ever. Even the best of standards get embraced and extended and with six or eight years of experience in the Bluetooth world, I’d bet that most SDRNews listeners have had just about as much luck as I getting supposedly “compatible” cellphones, headsets, keyboards, mice and so forth to communicate. Not to mention the world of IRDA during it’s fifteen year reign.
More importantly, what if it does work ? The novelty of hundreds of sensors surrounding an individual in daily roles as father, husband, home owner, patient, employee, manager, hobbyist, taxpayer, donor, citizen, advocate,contributor will wear very, very thin when the next layer of geographic information, vehicle routes, speeds, destinations, timing, access, denials of access, tolls, and third party associations become linked. Add in the transaction layer of currency exchange, payments. And an extra layer of web browsing habits.
If you need a PhD thesis topic, how about an ISO stack of various levels of interaction or degrees of potential risk and intrusiveness ?
The real danger is if it works, kinda. Sensors go in and out, data is missing or corrupted, but in the main the benefits outweigh the hassle. Fuel gets ordered on time, furnace filters show up at the door, energy bills are reduced. Prescriptions get re-ordered automatically -and it all gets punched into your Google calendar. And we develop a trust in a flawed system.
Just because you can do something is not necessarily the reason that you should do it.
CES 2008 Coverage for Tech Podcast Network
The Science of Scent
Click to view videos submitted or recommended by other SDR podcast listeners. . .
If you find a YouTube video that pertains to one of our news items, or have produced an item that would be of interest to SDR listeners, please send us the link slashdotreview{at}gmail.com
Save $10 on any order of $50 or more at GoDaddy.com!
Be sure to sign up for our upcoming roundtable. We will be using GoToMeeting. Also, be sure to check out GoToMeeting. Why? Because you can hold meetings right over the Net — from anywhere. Plus, you can hold all the meetings you want for one flat rate. To get your free 30-day trial , visit www.gotomeeting.com/techroundtable.
- Take 10% off any order at GoDaddy.com! Code SLASH
- Take $5 off any $30 order at GoDaddy.com! Code SLASH2
- .com Domains $6.95 at GoDaddy.com! Code SLASH3
- More blogs about SlashdotReview…
- Slashdot Review by Email – Sign up here:
