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A Night in the Hotel of the Future
Roland Piquepaille writes "Michael S. Lasky was lucky enough to test the amenities of the "Room of the Future", Room 267 of the Hilton Garden Inn in El Segundo, California. Among other things, the room provides a wall-mounted, 42-inch flat-screen HDTV Panasonic plasma television, a biometric room safe, free broadband, accessible via laptop or the TV, or a Panasonic massage chair. Needless to say, Lasky didn't have enough time to test everything during his one-night stay, but was quite pleased. Check this column for a summary and a picture of the "Room of the Future.""
... There was still a slot for the coin-op vibrating bed.
Some things never change
--
The 42 inch plasma screen on the wall cannot be turned off or the volume adjusted, and it constantly plays patriotic music to sooth you....
42" Plasma television - Good for watching porn
Biometric room safe -- so that the prostitute you bring in doesn't steal your stuff while you're sleeping
Free broadband -- surf all the porn you want on the big screen, or lookup local call girl services
Massage chair -- need I say more?
Have a good laugh like I did.
Newsfollow.com
Gotta love the 'executive toy' on the desk in the picture.
how are you supposed to know it's an executive's desk unless there's a kinetic sculpture on it? Truly, this is the future.
Kevin Fox
Big Deal. Hotel rooms should basically have a nice bed and nice bath. Personally, if I am going on vacation, I want to spend as much time OUT of the hotel room as possible but when I come back I want to get a good nights sleep and get clean the next morning. This type of stuff is designed to attract the people who bought those old Acer computers just because they had a black case.
In other news, Fred G. Sanford was lucky enough to test the amenities of the "Junkyard of the Future", Room 1 of the Sanford Arms in El Segundo, California.
Amenities included a bottle of Ripple, automatic heart monitoring equipment, and the neighbors goat.
Sounds a lot like the Le Meridien in Minneapolis.
d ation_us1788.shtml
Info:
http://www.lemeridien.com/usa/minneapolis/accommo
Ah, Smell Segundo, I remember it well. Bordered by a huge sewage treatment plant to the west, with it's lovely aromas, LAX to the north, with it's wonderful sound effects AT MAXIMUM VOLUME, and, to the south, the second oil refinery built on the West Coast (hence, the city name), with it's wonderful plumes of burning gases.
Home to more engineering firms & Friday night Happy Hours than I can remember.
I found this to be most interesting:
a compressor-less mini-refrigerator that is completely silent
I want more and more quiet appliances, including computers. Everything is so freakin' noisy now! I wish more industrial design took this into account. Yay future!
I hate to say it, but I'm a little tired of things that pawn themselves off as "of the future," when they're just showcases for the most expensive, newest stuff that's already floating around.
Maybe it's because the real "hotels of the future" won't be any more exciting than they are now. If they're motels, they'll be cheap - if they're five star hotels, they'll simply emulate what's in the best houses, plus a feature or two (whooo, biometric safe).
What's so futuristic about a room that uses technology available for the household for at least 10 years (broadband not withstanding). OK the tv is plasma, but it's still just a big tv. Anybody could offer a room like this if they could get away with charging the extra amount it would cost to pay for it.
Now when you can get a room like this at Motel6 for $39.95 at night, then wake me up.
-T
Just sounds like a a room filled with crap from Sharper Image. Hardly the future.
Sleep is for the Weak
(booming voice, 2ms echo) without the Hookers and Blow of the Future?
Old fashion courtesy masseuse?
I think I'll take the cute hotel-staff masseuse, you can keep the chair of the future.
â¦until the Gideonâ(TM)s Bible is provided in pdf and pdb formats.
This isn't the hotel room of the future... it's the hotel room of today, if you're rich enough.
~Berj
Give me a nice beach just outside my sliding-glass door, and you can keep all this other crap...
Not true. I just got back from a stay at Marriot hotels in both New Orleans and Atlanta. Both offered a plan called "Wired for Business" which cost $9.95 per day from noon to noon. The plan allowed you access to broadband internet, unlimited local calling, and unlimited long distance calling within the US. I'd say that's a pretty good deal.
Since I couldn't see what buttons I was pushing, the crotch-level nozzle blasting 102-degree water came as a shock--and my attempts to shut it off only caused other nozzles to splash me as if I were in a penitentiary riot. (Hilton's plan to install a voice-activated control could be just the solution.)
I hope the voice command to turn it off will be 'OMG MY WANG ARRRRRG!!!!!'
Polaroid. See what develops!!
Or is it just lots of luxury?
I mean, he wasn't flying around in his personal broomcopter that folds into a suit jacket. When I burgle your rich yuppie house, I don't call it time traveling! Although maybe that would work as a legimitate defense in court...is anyone here a physics attorney?
(-1, Raw and Uncut is the only way to read)
Exactly! I've been in a lot of rather expensive hotels with guilded lobbies, liveried doorman, etc., but had rooms that were not soundproofed from road noise, the elevator, or the ice machine around the corner. Several times, I've unplugged the ice machine in the hallway in the middle of the night just to get some sleep. Unfortatenly, unplugging the elevator is a bit more difficult. Ding!
Protected with Microsoft Passport.
RFID embedded potato chip bags. $5
GPS enabled water bottle. $6
$7 Liquor bottles featuring HP inkjet technology. Cannot consume liquor and fill bottle back up with 3rd party tap water, the bottle will still register empty. Attempts to reset liquor usage on said bottle will be a DMCA violation
So how is this the room of the future? This all sounds like stuff that's around already. The only part that's somewhat unusual is the biometric safe -- but when there are already biometric PDAs on the market, it's just not as impressive.
The Hotel Room of the Rich, maybe, but not Future. Sounds like Lasky was desperate to add some hype to a story.
A Hotel Room of the Future should be something that attempts to guess and then mimic how future innovations would tie in with the setting. (mimic being the keyword, because the object here is to show what hasn't been produced yet)
For instance, a room where the fabric-upholstered walls were made of ultra-thin flexible LCD sheets, and displayed a database of exotic settings. (faked for display with a simple projector) And a AI assistant that could order food from various restaurants, book theater tickets, or call a cab. (faked for display with a pre-recorded sequence) And a three-dimensional television set. (faked for display with iMax technology, requiring the use of glasses for demonstration)
Then I would be convinced that I was in a room of the future, or at least a mockup room of the future.
.
Punctanym: alternate spelling of words using punctuation or numerals in place of some or all of its letters; see 'leet'
Most of the /. readers read about the 42" plasma and the broadband access but they forgot how the hi-tech shower nearly burned the authors balls.
"the crotch-level nozzle blasting 102-degree water came as a shock."
The oil refinery there is tiny, it's a joke. The guys in Texas City would have a good laugh. And the proximity to LAX is a plus for business, not a minus. El Segundo also actually has a train stop, not that the train actually goes anywhere you'd want to go. Too bad the taxi drivers defeated the attempt to connect the train to LAX, it might actually be useful.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Interestingly, El Segundo recently made it to Relocate America's Top 100 places to live.
I have no idea why.
bp
These "things" of the future (homes, rooms, toilets) are always the same thing: They are not the Whatever of the Future, but simply the Whatever of the Very Rich.
I firmly believe that our futures hold simplicity, non-intrusiveness, and ease of use where technology is concerned. If television still exists in 100 years, it will be a nearly invisible unit, projecting onto a wall or an image floating in midair. Technology will dissolve into the very fabric of our lives as such that we will appear to be living in the 17th Century, when in fact we have lots of technology at our disposal.
I also do not believe that the capitalist system will disappear anytime soon. There will always be the rich, the middle class, and the poor. Most people cannot access high technology until it drops to commodity prices.
If you want to see what the future holds for technology, study the markets for the types of components that make up that technology. That which becomes cheap becomes widespread and ubiquitous.
# Erik
Maybe they have something similar in the hotel room. It's way quieter than our normal fridge.
My wife bought one of these coolers for camping. No compressor, but it does have a small fan to drive out the warm air.
Frankly I was strangely miffed that I wasn't the first one to bring a Peltier cooler into the house.
If you're into Star Trek, you can get extra kicks from reversing the polarity and turning it from a cooler to a heater. Instead of cooling the contents to 40 degrees below ambient, it warms to 80 degrees above.
Esteem isn't a zero sum game
I didn't see an orgasmatron in the list... When do we get that?
free broadband, accessible via laptop or the TV
I think he means: "Included in the price of the room", not "free".
eMelody Web Directory add your site today!
I'm getting a little annoyed at refering to references that refer to referenes that refer to a source article.
The content on Roland Piquepaille blog is always worthless. This is at least the third story he submitted (and was approved) that links you to his site, where they quotes from the article, and then says a very obvious sentance about that quote.
This all started back in Nov of 2002 see: for his articles
I don't get it. If you find something intresting, and you want to submit it to slash dot, then do so. Why make a blog, so you can submit, so you can refer to your blog.
I'm not getting into conspiracies about money or ads or anything. Near as I can tell none of that is involved here.
I just get annoyed going to his blogs to find he just quots the article, and has no real insight or other information.
-Malakai
-Malakai
A Dragon Lives in my Garage
I can guarantee that my dream room of the future sure as hell isn't in El Segundo :)
--D
It seems obvious that you don't travel on business much. When you are a tourist, the idea is to take in the sights, hit the nightclubs, &c. When you are a business traveller, you want one of two things: to not have to leave the hotel room (because you won't be in there very long), or to continue working.
I like to work in the evenings when on business trips, because the more I work, the sooner I get done, and the sooner I can go home.
It should have been plain that this hotel room in El Segundo was not meant for tourists... a tourist with that kind of dough wouldn't stay at the fucking Hilton Garden Inn El Segundo, he'd stay at Le Meridien or the W or something, in a place with some nightlife and some interesting things to see. (El Segundo's a nice enough place but it's not exactly a tourist mecca.)
Zaphod B
When duplication is outlawed, only outlaws will have
Yes, but does it have broom robots that chase you around the room, and does the DVD player hurl DVDs at you? It wouldn't be the Hotel Room of the Future without that! And does the muzak always play Raymond Scott's "Powerhouse?"
(note for the non-cartoon damaged, this is all a reference to two classic Warner Bros. shorts, one a remake of the other)
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
What he said was, and I quote, since it's still in my subject and yours, is "Free broadband? Not for long!"
In his opinion (and it wasn't really a troll), broadband prices will shoot through the roof in the not-too-distant future. Other people have pointed out that they do not yet, which is OK but has nothing to do with his post.
A much more interesting comparison would be long distance charges from hotel phones over time. When the phone was relatively new, did hotels have cheap phone access? Did it then later skyrocket in price to what we have today?
His opinion could well be correct - as hotels figure out how to bill it and people are more likely to demand such access, the price will quite likely go up.
You did mention one hotel chain having a service called "Wired for Buisness" that includes "unlimited" long distance calling. (Does that mean "free"? Or does that mean that you can call for as long as you want (but have to pay for it)? I'm assuming it's free.) That still does not necessarily defeat the original poster's point - was that service well advertised? Do they charge $15 to connect the phone if you make a call without purchasing the service?
I expect that eventually, broadband in hotel rooms will cost money. I'm expecting it will be cheap - something like $0.10/MB or something along those lines. I also expect flat-rate services will likely be offered as well. Broadband is still a "new" technology, and hotels are likely to be unsure of how to bill it for a while longer. Once it becomes more main-stream, expect to be asked to pay for it.
You are in a maze of twisty little relative jumps, all alike.
Why is this room "of the future"? The amenities are all items from this day and age and in working order aren't they? Usually when I hear product "of the future" I think of a concept product that is shown emulating it, but not really function.
Is it because in the future it will be commonplace?
Among the niceties of this high-tech hotel room are:
- a wall-mounted, 42-inch flat-screen HDTV Panasonic plasma television connected to a Technics receiver with surround-sound Bose speakers;
- a biometric room safe that uses a thumbprint as the lock and key;
- free broadband, accessible via laptop or the TV;
- a Panja touch-panel remote control that manages lighting levels and room climate; opens and closes the drapes; controls the TV, radio, and DVD player; and even repositions the head and foot of the king-size bed;
- a Panasonic massage chair,
- a heated toilet seat/bidet,
- a computerized five-nozzle shower,
- and a defogging bathroom mirror.
Or are they implying that the commonplace habits of being on the road will be
- Still watch alot of TV, but demand better quality of delivery
- Be Paranoid
- Be a geek
- Be a lazy geek
- Be a lazy geek with tension problems
- Be a lazy geek with tension problems and a cold ass
- Be a REAL geek
- Now you're spending way too much time in the bathroom. it's my turn.
"Last one in is a rotten goblin!" - Kepp
This is pretty dumb. These are just the latest toys. And many of them are not new at all.
t m is the "amazing" silent refrigerator.
-a second, smaller flat-screen LCD monitor next to the Jacuzzi bathtub;
--Not new -- just getting cheaper
-motion-detection lights that activate when guests enter the room;
--I had this when I was 12. (1990 or so) Bought something at radioshack to do it.
-a biometric room safe that uses a thumbprint as the lock and key;
--Not new -- just getting cheaper
free broadband, accessible via laptop or the TV;
--Not free (paid a premium for hotel room)
a Panja touch-panel remote control that manages lighting levels and room climate; opens and closes the drapes; controls the TV, radio, and DVD player;
--Can set this up using devices from http://www.smarthome.com
and even repositions the head and foot of the king-size bed;
-http://www.craftmatic.com/ Craftmatic has been around forever.
a compressor-less mini-refrigerator that is completely silent;
-- and here http://www.ajmadison.com/cgi-bin/ajmadison/BB52.h
a Panasonic massage chair, a heated toilet seat/bidet, a computerized five-nozzle shower, and a defogging bathroom mirror.
ahh nevermind
i guess it is kinda cool.
But it seems a bit much to get THIS excited over.
blah, blah, blah. im tired of typing
I Encrypt My IM's
to room of the rich...
nothing is "the future" in there. every bit of it is off the shelf available to the obscenely rich.
Show me self opening doors, lights that work when i say "illuminate" and the ability for me to issue a search command verbally to an avatar to search for information to display on that TV... then it's the room of the future.
hell give me the hotel room abiliteis that are in Johhny Mnenomic.. let me dial from, check messages, net,etc from the tv and it's remote.
Just dont try and pass off a bunch of high-priced things as "the future"
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
One of the most popular features is very simple - two hooks on the inside of the bathroom door.
Hilton is doing this because they made an expensive mistake. They tried a smart card system in New York, using the same card to unlock rooms, pay for meals, and make phone calls. People hated it. So now they use their rather boring location in El Segundo (next to LAX) to debug.
Hotels have a terrible problem with guest-visible technology - all their users are new. They don't want to hand a manual to each guest, or get calls for tech support. So it has to be subtle. This is good; too many products come with far too many controls for things the system should be managing itself. It's a nice design exercise to design technology for hotels.
With all of our jobs being outsourced to sweatshops overseas,
the "Room of the Future" is that cardboard box that the massage
chair came in, and digging for scraps in the dumpster, out behind the Hilton.
Room of the future? It's just some electronics and gadgets from the Sharper Image thrown into an ordinary hotel room.
All this calls for is more calls to the service desk: "How do I use the remote to turn the lights down, they are blinding me again!?"
I was thinking... for most of us, the hotel room of the future will resemble those Japanese coffin-hotels mentioned in William Gibson books. A 10 foot yellow polymer cylinder with a bed and a small TV in it. Residual body odour. Shared bathroom. Dangerous or at least unattractive neighbourhood.
Freedom: "I won't!"