Quick Guide to Digital Tech - The Internet of Things

Introduction

The second article in my series "quick guide to digital tech", this time about the Internet of Things. In this series I aim to give a quick and simple overview of a technology or term, with examples readers will be able to relate to. In the end I give a short comment on the current state of the technology as well as an outlook what a near and far future might bring.

Part two: The Internet of Things (IoT)

Overview

The traditional internet as we know it, is mostly about people. Products of people (text, images, video, commerce, services etc.), created by people, serving and shared by people. The Internet of Things is like the wording clearly indicates about connecting things to the internet, adding the ability to sense, communicate, touch and control. 

Things can interact and collaborate with other things, much like we as humans do. When machines interact and collaborate without the interference of humans, we also use the term machine-to-machine (M2M).

The concept "The Internet of Everything" (IoE) takes this concept even further, by adding people, data, things, and processes (how to manage the way people, data and things work together) together in a world of billions of sensor enabled objects. IoE is expected to create the entirely new capabilities for experiences, as well as economic opportunities for individuals, businesses and nations.

So why is the Internet of Things such a buzzword and why is the development within IoT skyrocketing? Let us look at some factors that make it possible:

• Inexpensive sensors - that simulate human senses. E.g. your smartphones ambient light sensor, that automatically adjusts brightness of your screen retails for below 3$.
• Wireless networks - everywhere.
• Cloud computing - where large amounts of data can be processed (without having the device doing it).
• Development in Artificial Intelligence (read about AI in the first edition of this series) and Big Data.
• Peoples increased digital need.

Examples

The uses cases for the Internet of Things are endless. Basically anything with an on/off switch could be connected to the internet. Usually IoT is categorised in ecosystems they appear in:

Smart cities:

• Ever been to Barcelona by car? The city has implemented a system, that directs you to the next available parking space, by embedding sensors in the asphalt. Besides smart parking, the city also offers smart lighting that enhance the efficiency of lampposts, and smart gardening controlling park irrigation. 

Smart home:

• Nest: internet connected thermostats that adjust the heating system in the house based on peoples personal preferences.
• Connected coffee machines and fridges: are some of the most used examples of home appliances connected to the internet. So if you do not already own one, I will leave you with some official commercials to see what the deal is: Nespresso Prodigio, and Samsung Family Hub.
• Philips Hue: a smart lightning system, allowing users to control ambient light and motion sensors for automation and energy efficiency.

Transportation:

• Connected vehicles: self-driving cars that connect to cloud based traffic and navigation systems, but in the future also to pedestrians, smart cities (e.g. smart parking, see above). Connected vehicles give an outlook into the Internet of Everything, where cars, people, processes and data come together for a fully automised experience.

Healthcare:

• Phillips: offers several connected personal health care products, like body scales, thermometers and even a smart connected toothbrush, that reveals your brushing habits and coaches you not to miss the troubled areas. These devices usually are not directly connected to the internet, but offer bluetooth connections to smartphones, that then transmit the data to cloud services. The company also offers several far more advanced solutions for hospitals and health care professionals.

Wearables:

• Smart watches & activity trackers: Apple, Pebble, TAG Heuer, Samsung, Garmin, Fitbit and others. Fitbit, the well known wristband, tracks your activity and sleep patterns. Smartwatch apps allows users to control other IoT enabled devices like Philips Hue and Nest.
• Under Armour: connected smart shoes that track and analyse your running metrics.
• Microsoft Hololens, a truly remarkable device that brings holograms to life by mixing and blending digital and real elements. I have been lucky to try it out a few times, but see for yourself in this video [https://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-hololens/en-us].
• Embeddable implants: devices and microchips that go under your skin for a full cyborg experience.

Consumer goods:

• Hello Barbie: a Wi-Fi connected barbie doll, that listens to children and uses cloud based voice recognition to understand them and talk back. Hello Barbie came to fame, because she could easily be hacked, listening into conversation without the user noticing it. This raises the question of the Internet of Things most fragile challenge - privacy and security.
• Samsung: is already this year aiming to have 90% of their entire consumer product catalogue connected to the internet, with 100% in 2020.

Industrial/agricultural:

• John Deere: is deploying sensors, wireless communications, and autonomous driving technology on farm systems for a future of data driven farming. The company creates information sharing networks between farming machines, on-ground sensors, satellites, and farmers for tracking and interpreting information generated at each point. Imagine the amount of data created in these application, a topic covered in the next article in this series about Big Data.
• Industrial IoT (IIoT): sometimes also called Industry 4.0 (favourite word of the german chancellor) would be worth a "quick guide" on its own. I recommend this article that describes the concept pretty well, in the case it should grab your attention. [https://goo.gl/JbQWMX]
• In a more lighthearted matter, the example section would not be complete without introducing you to the concept of the "Internet of Sheep". [https://goo.gl/wftfYr]

State of the technology and future outlook

The concept of the Internet of Things is not new. Many of us already have several internet enabled devices, that communicate with other devices, sense the surroundings or human health conditions and allows us to control our environment. But is does not stop here. Once the phone was not very "smart", and today we can not imagine a world without it. This will happen to most other devices as well, bringing us closer to the Internet of Everything. 

In a future perspective, scientists are experimenting with smart dust, internet connected dust particles that holds lenses and digital sensors like those we use in cameras, that can be injected into the brain or used in miniature drones and robots. Welcome to the cyborg age - Big Data and the Internet of Things gone wild!

But before that we have a major challenges when it comes to IoT. Security, privacy and legal nightmares are a major challenge we need to solve. When cars, your smart home and your kids favourite doll become connected, they become victims of hackers, criminals and megalomaniac corporations. And who wants your insurance company to access the bacterial flora of your mouth?

Some opportunistic futurists proclaim, that we in 2025 will have 11 trillion devices as part of the internet of things. Yes, that was trillions - your phone, watch and coffeemaker are just the beginning.

Next article in the series “Quick Guide to Digital Tech" is about Big Data.

Series Overview:

1. Part one: Artificial Intelligence
2. Part two: Internet of Things
3. Part three: Big Data
4. Part four: Blockchain
5. TBA