The world is changing. Our thermostat sets itself, our watches keep track of how many steps we take, our contact lenses detect if our blood sugar is low. Everything in our world is suddenly connected to an alarming degree. Everyone agrees that the “Internet of Things” is going to (or already has) change(d) the world. The next trillion dollar industry and all that. But like all game changing industries there will be winners and losers. Understanding the technology and use cases for these smart “things” is going to be key to make sure that we are on the side of the winners.
Let’s start with the term itself, “Internet of Things”. Full disclosure, I hate this term. I’m going to avoid it. It is the least descriptive term imaginable. Things? What things? And what is the internet anymore? More importantly what isn’t the internet a part of? Let’s instead focus on Connected Devices. This is slightly better. It implies that the device is connected to something else. It doesn’t have the be the Internet it could be connected to a private cloud. Or a mesh network of other devices.
On this blog I’ll be trying to watch the industry trends. Dive deeper in the technologies supporting these Connected Devices. I’ll try to be upfront about my biases. I am a Google employee and will probably push harder for Google’s technologies and spend more time on how they could aid and assist companies in getting into the space. But this isn’t intended to be a marketing space for Google products. I will spend time across the entire space.
I should stop here and say that my views in no way reflect the views of Google.
I hope you’ll join me on this journey. Feedback is always appreciated. Let’s get started…
