Disney Takes Another Stab at the House of the Future

Disney has announced that they are going to take another stab at showing us the "House of the Future". The 5000-square-foot house will appear normal from the outside but will house gadgets like lights and thermostats that automatically adjust when someone enters the room and countertops that can identify food placed on it and suggest recipes. "Millions of Disneyland visitors lined up a half-century ago to catch a glimpse of the future: a home teeming with mind-blowing gadgets such as handsfree phones, wall-sized televisions, plastic chairs, and electric razors and toothbrushes. [...] The $15 million home is a collaboration of The Walt Disney Co., Microsoft Corp., Hewlett-Packard Co., software maker LifeWare and homebuilder Taylor Morrison. Visitors will experience the look of tomorrow by watching Disney actors playing a family of four preparing for a trip to China."

Comments

Any day now

[Anonymous Coward]

In addition to the standard house-of-the-future home automation, the house will also include its own micro-fusion electric generator (running on tap water), a landing pad for the flying car, and Duke Nukem Forever running on a secure update to Microsoft Windows.

Re:Any day now

[Anonymous Coward]

Clippy:
It appears you are burning your toast. Would you like some help with that?

UAC:
You are attempting to microwave a Cup-o-Noodle
[Allow] [cancel]

Don't forget the most important feature!

[morgan_greywolf]

Full support for multiple DRM technologies is built into everything!

Re:Don't forget the most important feature!

[Locklin]

I'm sorry, you want to use your toaster in the bathtub? You have to purchase extra permissions to do that: $50 at amazon.com.

Remember, breaking usage agreements is STEALING. You wouldn't steal an old ladies purse, would you?

Any unauthorized appliance usage, or sharing of appliances is deemed a criminal offense and will be instantly reported directly to Microsoft.com. Your house will enter a "restricted usage" mode, and will drop to below freezing until sufficient licenses are purchased.

Time to join the Luddites...

[owlnation]

countertops that can identify food placed on it and suggest recipes

A whole house that has pop-up ads. That's not my future, I promise you. I'm thinking those bastards at the Sirius Cybernetic Corporation had a hand in the design.

Re:Time to join the Luddites...

[rucs_hack]

Um, yeah, of course.

What do you think are the chances of a computer controlled house with net access that *doesn't* spam you with ads?

There will be three kinds of utility for your web house. I shall elaborate.

Basic:

All the 'features', but to access them you must willingly subject yourself to advertising, and targeted recommendations.

Standard:

All the features, no non elective ads, but you're still likely to have 'great suggestions' coming in, facebook app-like, trying to get you to winningly accept the ads..

Premium.

They give you the device, and leave you the fuck alone. Expect this to be itself in one of two further sub-categories

sub-cat 1: Far too expensive for most people.

sub-cat 2: Available only to selected people, likely not even able to be bought.

Re:Time to join the Luddites...

[UberOogie]

Not only that, but can you imagine the amount of research they are going to have to do with cannibals considering that human hands will be the most common thing on the countertop?

Re:Time to join the Luddites...

[aywwts4]

You forgot number four.

Ultimate:

I hacked my home by running a buffer overflow exploit on my blender, loaded linux and now my house can fly to the moon.

Trip to china

[Mickyfin613]

Visitors will experience the look of tomorrow by watching Disney actors playing a family of four preparing for a trip to China to welcome their new Chinese overlords. Fixt.

Home of the future...

[DragonWriter]

The 5000-square-foot house will appear normal from the outside but will house gadgets like lights and thermostats that automatically adjust when someone enters the room and countertops that can identify food placed on it and suggest recipes.

So, technology that's been around for decades but not popular in homes, and technology that is a solution looking for a problem (if I've chosen to buy food, bring it home, and set it one the counter [or take it out of the fridge and set it on the counter] chances are I already had a use in mind—countertops that suggest recipes for food placed on them seem about as useful as as a closet that suggest where I might want to go based on the clothes I take out.)

For $15 million, I'm not impressed.

Re:Home of the future...

[AvitarX]

What would be cool though is fridge that checks it´s contents and tells you recipes along with thigns you could make with just a little extra.

It would solve the "there's nothing to make, but the fridge is full" dilemma.

Re:Home of the future...

[countSudoku()]

Oh boy, I can't wait for the future house to tell me it's having a problem getting rid of a virus in the fridge-server and all my Choco-Tacos have melted! Then I'll set a nice tri-tip onto the counter and see if I can't get around the "Unrecognized Item on Counter! Abort, Retry, Ignore?" displayed on the inside of my eyelids. Future House I already hate you! :)

Wake me when the house of the future runs on a platform that is secure and stable and relatively free of solutions in search of problems.

Re:Home of the future...

[jedidiah]

Better yet, it keeps track of how long stuff has been in there or
checks for chemical signs of spoilage. From this it can either tell
you that it's time to clean things out or time for a "leftover casserole".

"Warning: Jar on back of bottom shelf has not been touched in 123 days..."

"The 6th Day" had a pretty good Future-Fridge.

Bathroom jokes

[SoundGuyNoise]

Oh the possibilites... - What happens if I'm in the shower and the OS crashes? Will it never turn off? - Will the toilet only accept one kind of input? - Will the house "phone home" to let said manufacturers know what I do in the house? (For statistics only, no personal information of course) - Will my furniture be compatible with the floor? - What if the fridge is stuck in an infinite loop and keeps ordering me eggs? - Can it defrag my junk drawer?

Re:Bathroom jokes

[sconeu]

Will the toilet only accept one kind of input?

G-d, I hope not. It had better take at least two kinds of input (or two kinds of your output). Preferably at least three (if you get sick and need to shout into the great white telephone).

Re:Bathroom jokes

[JonWan]

Or worse... they install clippy.

"I see you're trying to masterbate, Would you like me to show you a picture of:"

1. Britney Spears nude.
2. Goatse.
3. Natalie Portman petrified and covered in grits.

Great. A house that nags

[ishmalius]

As if we didn't hear enough "suggestions" in our daily lives. Didn't Ray Bradbury kill his house for this very same reason?

Impossible Future?

[drapeau06]

Shouldn't a "house of the future" be smaller than current houses? If they are to be available to all humans, I mean.

Also, I still have hope that USians will start using the metric system someday... so overall, I'd suggest that a more sensible house of the future would be about 100 or 200 square metres.

House of the future compatible with today?

[HalAtWork]

Wouldn't the house of the future be made up of easily interchangable parts that can be easily retrofitted to existing structures? It wouldn't be something designed from the ground up with today's bleeding-edge technologies. Part of the hassle of doing work in the houses of today are parts, fixtures, or even the location of holes, that are of a new standard and plain just don't work with anything else.

our own little worlds

[Statecraftsman]

Much of the project will showcase a network that makes the house "smart" and follows family members from room to room - even adjusting artwork - to preset personal preferences.

Does anyone get the feeling that we're all increasingly seeing what we want to see? Headphones and ipods mean we're less often exposed to the music of our parents, friends, and coworkers. We all go to our own favorite websites to check news(be it factual, entertaining, or agreeable) or socialize or whatever. We spend hours and hours in whole virtual worlds that are difficult to appreciate or explain without having spent those many hours there.

While I think it would be awesome to see the art and decor transform depending on who walks into a room...this just highlights to me that we may become more disconnected from each other as we optimize the digital world to our own personal likes. Not that it's bad...maybe we were all meant to relate to each other through screens, keyboards, and mice. Maybe the benefit of the digital world is that it provides a better way to share experience when we choose. Either way, it's good to recognize what's going on.

But ...

[shis-ka-bob]

That may work in the House of the Future, but it will never be approved by the Senate of the Future.

Re:I would like to see...TWO BRICKS BEING SMASHED

[sm62704]

Microsoft has a hand in it, so considering how they write their software I doubt you can remove or replace anything in thhe house without the walls turning blue, black, or crashing down.

If you remove the laser razor is it "House Of The Future Lite"? I'll bet you can only use Microsoft Light Bulbs and Microsoft Lamps because the bulb screws, light sockets, and wall plugs are all nonstandard and proprietary.

I can't wait to see how it all works together

[stormguard2099]

Father: Come on medicine cabinet! I need my insulin!
Automated medicine cabinet: The serial number on your refrigerator seems to be invalid. Please call 1-800-chinasoft for assistence.
Father: Alright but hurry up I have to get to work.
Phone: It appears your telephone service provider is not supported. Can I interest you in signing up for MSNfone?
Father: I knew I should have installed linux but I just couldn't find those drivers for my countertop and showercurtain .

Re:Additional feature

[Creepy]

not only that - the friendly Microsoft voice activated software will help you run your home

~~Home of the Future Premium Edition~~
me: Computer! shower on.
computer: warning - this will change your current hardware settings, which requires admin approval - are you sure you want to do that? Say 'yes' to continue, 'no' to cancel.
me: yes
~shower turns on cold water~
me: computer - set water to 36 degrees
computer: sets temp.
me: computer -this is still freezing - I said use Celsius yesterday - don't you learn?
computer: command not understood.
me: computer: set water to 36 degrees CELSIUS
computer: this is a US based system and only allows Fahrenheit temperatures. For international measurement packs, install House of the Future Ultimate Edition.
me: *%*#%*^ - computer - set temp to 98F!
computer: House temperature is now set to 98 degrees Fahrenheit.
me: aaargh - no computer, set shower water temperature to 98F and house temp to 70F.
computer: shower water temp set to 98F. please enter commands one at a time.
me: computer: set house temp to 70F.
computer: house temp set to 70F
~~shower~~
me: computer - shower off
computer: warning - this will change your current hardware settings, which requires admin approval - are you sure you want to do that? Say 'yes' to continue, 'no' to cancel.
me: yes!
~~shower turns off~~

Re:I would like to see...

[ushering05401]

I would like to see a completely sound-proofed house with all appliances designed to work as quietly as possible.

After all, it is highly unlikely that the volume of sensory input people have to endure outside the home is going to decrease anytime soon.

Hell, people are already patenting devices to track your eyes so their adverts can talk to you if they think they have your attention.

My home of the future might well resemble a faraday cage.

Re:What about urinalysis?

[Grishnakh]

Discovery Channel had a show about this called 2057. The toilet checked your urine for drug usage, and if it detected it, notified your insurance company who then canceled your health insurance. So in the show, a guy who drank some alcohol on the weekend got his insurance canceled while he was in the ER because he fell out a window (unrelated to the alcohol).

No thanks. I have no interest in this "smart house" crap at all. In the future, I want a house that's extremely eco-friendly (and consequently has no utility bills), but all this intrusive technology connected to mega-corporations I have no interest in.

Re:I would like to see...

[hachete]

every gadget will have NO REPEAT NO lights, not even the smallest flicker. Even the damn mac has the green light on the power line. My epson printer has three, and one continually blinks.

Profound changes must take place, and NO LIGHTS is one of them.