eSuds

AndyAMPohl writes "An article from Yahoo! News mentions IBM plugging washers and dryers into the internet. This has several advantages: coins aren't needed since credit cards are accepted, the machines can be monitored through the web for maintenance purposes and to see if there are any machines available, and users can even control things like add soap!" The eSuds homepage has informations, FAQs, etc.

Comments

I thought...

[mikeage]

...internet connect appliances were all washed up?
*groan*

Socks?

[kefoo]

Does this mean IBM can help me find all the socks I lose in the wash?

Important application left out

[rknop]

Once Microsoft DRM systems are in place on the washers and dryers, clothing can be checked for DMCA and other copyright/patent/trademark violations. Have a DeCSS shirt? The dryer door locks and refuses to release your clothes until the police can come by and talk to you. Have a company trademark on clothing which is not officially licensed? Likewise.

:)

-Rob

Gratuitous Link Alert!

[Your_Mom]

Of course, this has already been done byt the Geeks at MIT

Quintessential New Economy Quote

[writermike]

"We're going to revolutionize the way [laundry] is done on the Internet!"

:-D

---

And Now

[Xaoswolf]

Geeks will never again be known for their poor heygiene due to spending days on the computer. Now with the click of a button, we can again become clean.

Can't wait

[theRhinoceros]

Add this to your list of College Experiences to Remember:

"Dude, your floor smells horrible."

"Yeah, I know. Nobody can do their laundry."

"Why not?"

"Some bastard hacked the laundry server. Again."

"Damn, that's m4d l33t, d00d."

Ha! I just 0wnz0red your laundry!

[liquidsin]

Hello gentlemen.
What you say?
All your socks are belong to us!

Upcoming messages on this thread...

[suss]

* Imagine a beowulf cluster of washing machines!
* Someone slashdotted my dryer!
* Overclocked washer shrunk my clothes!

and ofcourse...

* But does it run Linux?

Call me an alarmist, but...

[Tsar]

...I've seen The Silence of the Lambs a few times, and the "machine availability" option bothers me. I can easily envision some sicko sitting at his PC at 3AM, surfing the all the laundromats around the local university, searching for one with just one dryer running.

Hopefully, there'll be video surveillance (did I just say that?), with a closed-circuit recorded feed and signs indicating constant monitoring. Also, adjusting the web interface to display simply that at least n machines are available might negate just that sort of abuse.

Re:Call me an alarmist, but...

[GutterBunny]

The movie would probably go like this...

(opening scene) killer surfs net looking for single washer running at 3am.He finds one in a small laundry in the dorm accross from his apartment.
(scene 2) we see killer donning black gloves approaching the laundry.
(scene 3) the laundry door opens
(scene 4) killer looks up to find large football player washing his jock strap after traveling for 6 hours on a small charter bus having lost by 42 points to a bunch of woosy Ivy Leaguers.
(scene 5) killer is shown on a stretcher rethinking his profession.

I'd probably spend 7 bucks to see it.

Nevermind that...

[billbaggins]

The anti-geeks at Macalester (liberal arts, St. Paul, MN) did it a couple years ago too. Monitoring isn't possible, but we did pay by swiping our student ID cards, and whole system was connected to the ethernet.

There was one eensy tiny problem when they set it up, though... somebody misconfigured the machines, so that they tried to set themselves up as router/gateways for our network... no Internet for Mac for about a week until they figured out what was going on...

eFlush, anyone?

[bachelor3]

How long before someone does this with bathroom stalls?

The people at Icepick have included toilet stats in their wired house, namely temperature and duration; man, I hope temperature refers to bathroom temperature and not...ugh.

Yeah great

[WickerChap]

Some script kiddie is gonna put bleach my jeans.

umm...

[Triv]

(Note: I didn't RTFA. You've been warned)

Ok, so I can see the advantages, what with the machines taking credit cards, etc, but it seems kinda silly to me. You still need to be there to load the friggin' thing up after all, so you might as well pay with cash, and personally I'm not so anal with my laundry that there's a specific point in the cycle I need to add soap. laundry+soap=clean, I don't need to add such a pesky variable as soaptime.

If the whole point is to reduce work then they need to eliminate the trip itself - once you're physically there, anything else you need to do (soap, paying) doesn't change the fact that I've hauled 30 pounds of laundry three blocks, waited around for an hour and hauled it back. Besides, they don't need to be connected to the 'net proper to take creditcards - a plain vanilla phone line to the creditcard company's server will do just fine.

I'm not saying this isn't a cool hack, the epitome of geek, but I'm not going to be really impressed until a robot picks up my laundry, washes it, debits my creditcard and returns it, preferably folded.

Triv

Re:umm...

[Erasmus Darwin]

"(Note: I didn't RTFA. You've been warned)"

That's pretty obvious, as your points are mostly addressed by the first two paragraphs of the article. Cash isn't always convenient (as people sometimes don't have enough change for the machine), the site lets you know if machines are available (as people don't want to drag their 30 pounds of laundry down there only to discover all the machines are full), and it lets you know when your laundry's done (as people generally have better things to do than sit in a laundromat and wait).

You're trying to be funny, but consider...

[dpilot]

cell phone batteries.

Some cell phone makers are unhappy about third-party batteries. So they encrypted the status information that the phone reads from the battery. If the phone detects an off-brand battery, it drains it - quickly. They then claim protection under the DMCA for the encrypted battery status readout, to prevent third-party reverse engineering.

So though I know your juxtposition of DMCA and laundry is meant to be funny, it may not be too far from the truth. Imagine for a moment "detergent cartridges" so that the washer can meter and monitor detergent. Then encrypt that link and claim DMCA protection. Now assume strategic alliances between washer and detergent makers. When you buy your washer, you've just chosen what detergent you're going to use - until alliances shift, and then you get to change brands.

The situation might be similar to inkjet cartridges, including home refills, except in that case the horses got out of the barn before they got the door shut. If such a washer/detergent alliance were to get into this mode, no doubt they'd look at both cell phone batteries and inkjet cartridges to plot their course. I really wish they'd look to their customers, instead. But in these days of the DMCA and criminalizing your customers...

humor

[Alsee]

Beowolf Cluster, better known as a laundomat.

Traceroute: Missing sock.

What happened? There's 3 inches of water in the basment!
Ping flood.

All clothes come with additional new tag: EULA

The new tag may NEVER be removed under penalty of law.

FBI arrests student for hacking washing mashine: Claims he didn't realize it it was on a .MIL network.

RIAA proposes bill granting them immunity from prosecution for any clothes they damage, so long as they suspect the laundy contained a copyright violation.

Dude! What's that pile of slag in the basment?
Somebody posted a link to my washing machine on slashdot.

Slashdot article on the difficulies of doing landry with over-clocked machine submerged in liquid nitrogen.

Microsoft announces X-box hydrid.

What's the gross gunk all over your clothes?
The filter on the drier couldn't handle all the SPAM and it backed up.

Java Virtual Machine gets clothes virtually clean.

Error: These clothes require cookies. Enable cookies and try again.

www.britenyspearsunderwear.com

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