What People Want From Smart Homes

Hallie Siegel writes: Despite the energy savings and environmental friendliness that has often been associated with smart home technologies, a recent poll showed that consumers primarily want their homes to optimize for their comfort level and personal preference (45%). Security/Safety and Energy Savings tied in second place (18%). Environmentally friendliness came in at only 11%. Note that the three most voted choices have direct advantages for the user, as opposed to Environmental Friendliness, which is primarily a societal benefit. What would you look for in a smart home?

Comments

Nothing.

[weilawei]

I want my home to be stupid, to not have a telescreen, and to not track me or sell my habits to third parties. ;)

Re:Nothing.

[Anrego]

Yup.

Personally I'd be way more open to this stuff if it didn't want an internet connection.

Ultimately I see very little practical application for any of this anyway. As I said in a previous comment, I played around with home automation "back in the day" and while it's nifty, it doesn't really add a whole lot of value outside of some very specialized use cases.

Re:Nothing.

[dAzED1]

you're a horrible person for wanting such unreasonable things. Clearly you just don't know how incredibly useful a "smarthome" is. And stuff.

Re:Nothing.

[Defenestrar]

I don't know - with the research they've done over the past few decades about circadian rhythm, I can see a lot of benefit from lighting that responds in both intensity and color to time and or motion. Likewise with HVAC. But neither of these needs the outside 'net.

Where I really see benefit from external communication would be mostly Boolean data such as whether the kids made it home from school, is there a break in the dog's underground fence line, is moisture pooling where it's not supposed to, or whether the CO/smoke detector has alerted. For information that goes in instead of out, I could also see a benefit for automatic storm shuttering when NOAA issues a severe thunderstorm warning and an automatic disabling of the sprinkler system if the county passes a watering moratorium (i.e. save me from fines if I'm absentminded and forget about turning it off).

Re:Nothing.

[TWX]

Fairly simple sensor equipment on the house could help you with those though, and we've been able to send notifications via all manner of methods for years and years, via technology as low-end as 9600 baud TAP gateways through your cell provider worst-case.

You could monitor humidity in known problem areas like near hot water heaters and HVAC condensate drip pans with simple sensors fed by a two-wire solution. You could monitor wind speed and direction, plus temperature and rainfall through an automated weather station that sits on the roof. You could monitor basements and other low places for flooding with simple sensors that could also pack-in CO and fire safety. You could install RFID interrogators at the exterior doors and put RFID tags on your kids' backbacks (or use the ones built in to clothes or shoes or the like) to know when they've passed through the doorway, and you could even compare their RFID tag versus no tag when the doors are opened to know if someone else is entering. You could even use heat sensors to turn off lights in rooms that people have vacated and to turn off multimedia equipment like video projectors when no one is there to watch, if you're really feeling fancy, control the HVAC ducting to stop excessively cooling spaces that no one is using, like spare bedrooms, offices, workshops, dining rooms, kitchens, etc.

None of those features requires an Internet connection to use, though for convenience the ability to notify the owner could be handy. A quick e-mail or text message would be enough for most, and for things like potentially unauthorized entry, a camera picture could help the homeowner avoid false-positives with the alarm company and police.

What I really want a home to do though, is to clean itself. Self-clean the toilets, the sinks, the shower and bathtub, the tile, the carpet, the kitchen, and to be able to lift dust off of things and dispose of it. Do the laundry and sort/fold/hang it. That would be where the usefulness to homeowners comes in, not trinkets to automate processes that already aren't really inconvenient. It might also be convenient if the home recognizes the owner when he or she arrives, and lets them in without needing a key or other 'thing you have' on one's person.

Re:Nothing.

[cayenne8]

Where I really see benefit from external communication would be mostly Boolean data such as whether the kids made it home from school,

You know, more and more I'm glad I grew up in a day before you could so easily be tracked as a kid, and no cell phones, etc.

It made it more fun to be a kid. Sure, I was mischievous, and well, frankly, some of the things we did as kids and teens would likely be categorized as borderline terrorism...but it was a part of growing up. Experimenting and well...just being a kid at the time.

When young, I would leave the house, go play with friends roam mine and the adjacent neighborhood...first on foot, then bike and skateboard. When really young, my Mom's basic rule was to call from a friend's home every couple hours to check in. When older, not really even that. My parents both worked, and I'd come home from school alone or go play with friends. During the summers as a teen...I'd be at home on my own, run with friends, make my own lunches...etc.

It was fun having that independence and I never got into what you would call trouble, no more than just being a boy growing up.

Nowdays...geez, I guess mine (and all my peers at the time) parents would be cited for child neglect.

Ok....now..GET OFF MY LAWN.

;)

Re:Nothing.

[ozmanjusri]

Personally I'd be way more open to this stuff if it didn't want an internet connection. Ultimately I see very little practical application for any of this anyway.

I bought and am using a Ninja Block, and use it for keeping an eye on my vegetable garden (soil moisture), remotely controlling appliances, hot water etc when I'm away, home security, and simple stuff like switching on overhead fans from my phone. For me at least, it's a very practical tool.
https://ninjablocks.com/#home/

Mine's connected to the internet so I can get alerts and manage my home from my phone, but I understand they can run air-gapped if you want to keep it off grid. In my case, given it's open hardware and open source, I'll take the risk.

Re:Nothing.

[TWX]

In defense of the Roomba, I don't think it was ever meant to replace your upright.

And that is why I never bothered with one. Now that I've seen how poor they are at actually covering a room in a sane, even manner I'm glad that I skipped it.

I really don't understand why they never built a good, upscale one that actually did the job well, especially now that we've got powerful appliances that are battery-powered, like those 48V lawnmowers. It should be possible to build an automated vacuum that's actually strong enough to achieve good results on a regular basis, so long as the owner is willing to dump the collection bin from time to time and to shut off the thing if a spill or other obstruction that can't be handled by the vacuum is addressed.

Re:Nothing.

[Smerta]

When I lived in Germany I saw quite a few of them. Lawns tend to be smaller and flatter than in the U.S. Also, landscaping services are more expensive, in general, over in Europe. Last thing, and unfortunately I'm being serious, the U.S. is pretty litigious, so companies are hesitant to jump into the market.

I think there are about 10 companies or so making robotic mowers. Could be wrong, but I thought you could get a Husqvarna in the U.S. now. They require a wire to be buried along the perimeter of your yard so the 'bot knows when it needs to stop & turn around.

I';ve always wondered what happens if you lose power at home, and the buried wire no longer emits its signal. Probably a battery backup, and you have to tell the 'bot to run no longer than the battery can last.

Re:Nothing.

[golodh]

@Weilawei

So do I, but the mainstream seems to be moving towards something very different.

As in: the majority of consumers seems to want maximum "comfort" (read: "ease of use and no hassle", a.k.a. "I'm lazy and dumb so I need smart appliances"), and that's what industry will provide (on pain of being marginalised and ultimately disappearing).

And guess what? Ease of use and "no hassle" means offloading lots of detailed control decisions to the manufacturer. And that means that said manufacturer has got to distinguish themselves by offering comfort and taking away decisions and cares from home-owners.

It is understood that home-owners are willing to pay for that and that manufacturers incur no penalties by offering dumb gear and putting the "intelligence" on their servers. Those decisions (blinds closed or open, heating higher or lower, anticipating the home-owner's homecoming, level of lighting, when to switch on the air conditioning, burglar alarms, suppressing false alarms cause e.g. by pets etc. etc.), still have to be taken of course. Just not by the home-owner.

Taken together this means a big fat premium on supplying dumb, (but sensor-rich) proprietary hardware, collecting as much data as possible on the habits and preferences of the home-owner, his/her family, children, pets, neighbours etc.etc., storing and analysing all that on the company's servers, and selling the resulting control information to the home-owner as a service. Look for upcoming legislation that not only allows but also compels "domestic service" companies to "share" their information with everyone from law-enforcement, insurance companies (think fire insurance, burglary insurance, health insurance (!)), medical care providing companies (think monitoring of elderly people), market research companies, advertising companies and any other interested party you can think of.

I'm pessimistic about being able to opt out, let alone to stop this kind of thing. For one thing, mass-production will drive down the price of the "mainstream" systems (whatever form they will take), thus marginalising any non-mainstream hardware. Of course manufacturers have zero interest in supplying hardware that will work without their (or another company's) service package so stand-alone or "user-controlled" hardware will come at a premium. In addition you may find that your insurance premiums are higher than without "smart home" automation.

All in all, the stable market situation will probably be a load black-box hardware that needs daily updates and tuning by proprietary off-site control software that eats your privacy for breakfast (on an ongoing daily basis).

Re:Nothing.

[AmiMoJo]

I'm currently installing a floodlight for my driveway so I can park a bit easier and see to plug in the car's charge cable. I'm using a standard RF remote control to turn it on manually from the car, because there isn't really any better option at the moment. PIR sensors seem unreliable with EVs, and you end up having them either turn on every time someone walks past or not come on until well after you need them.

I'd love a simple system that noticed my phone was pulling up to the driveway and turned the light on. Bluetooth might work, or just use the phone's location data. Even better, use the car's location data since it has GPS that is on all the time. Needs an internet gateway though, and unless I set up my own server it's going to alert some company that I'm home. Thing is, the mobile phone company already knows that, and Google knows because Google Now has figured out where I live. I'm not too worried about all that as long as I can reasonably trust the company in question, and am in full control of what I choose to share.

It's a trade off. If it were done securely I'd be happy with it.

Re:Nothing.

[Translation Error]

What I really want a home to do though, is to clean itself. Self-clean the toilets, the sinks, the shower and bathtub, the tile, the carpet, the kitchen, and to be able to lift dust off of things and dispose of it.

But a really smart home will eventually realize the most efficient way to keep the house clean is to eliminate the people and pets in it...

Yup

[Anrego]

Isn't this what we all figured out back in the x10/smarthome days. After you get over the gee-wiz star trek appeal, there's very little that we actually want to automate, and most of those things are already well handled by stand alone devices which benifit very little from integration. My automatic coffee maker and thermostat don't need an internet connection, and having lights come on automatically when you walk in the room is cool and nifty, for about 20 minutes, then it is overcome by the annoyance of the lights turning off all the time because occupancy sensors suck. Sure we can try to make up justifications, and there may be some people who legitimately have a valid use case, but I think this is gonna be home automation fad part 2.

My old x10 gear still makes an appearance around Christmas, and I still use some of it in my bedroom to control the lights and ceiling fan from my bed, but my (at one time) expensive ocelot controller and like a few dozen various bits sit in a box collecting dust.

(Also usual warning that x10 is a terrible system that I wouldn't recommend to an enemy).

Re:Yup

[Dutch Gun]

From the article:

General Electric, in particular, entered smart lighting market with the introduction of GE Link, a smart LED bulb that consumers can remotely control from anywhere in the world and sync with other connected devices.

Wow, really? A bulb you can remotely control from anywhere in the world, huh? And I'll bet the service that let's us do all that will only cost us $9.99 a month, right? What a bargain. I mean, I've always wanted to turn my kitchen light on or off from the grocery store. That's going to be so handy!

Meh. At some point, this phase 2 of the home automation fad will probably boil down to a few practical gizmos that people find useful, and history will simply laugh at our "smart bulbs" for the ridiculous overkill it represents in attempted convenience.

Re:Yup

[Anrego]

Anything where the accepted standard is to send a command 3 times to increase (not even guarantee but just increase) the probability of it getting there is a bad sign.

Not to mention just about anything that produces electrical noise can interfere with the damn things. About a year ago that fan I mentioned in my bedroom would randomly turn off and on. It wasn't really all that annoying (not nearly as annoying had it been the light), but none the less it bugged me and I couldn't figure out what the hell was going on. About a month later, the UPS I had connected to my network gear died, and the problem went away.

I know people who spent a great deal of money buying filters and bridges and amplifiers and all kinds of things to try and make the damn system work. I have to assume that just like the Nigerian 419 scams, after you've bought so much into it, you can't help spend "just a little more" to see the promised light at the end of the tunnel. Luckily I didn't have too many of those kind of problems, but the system even when working was still slow and unreliable.

Re:Yup

[Noah Haders]

home automation will explode when apple home kit comes on the scene. that will be when everything starts to make sense.

Re:Yup

[gregmac]

I've done some X10 in the past, but now all my stuff is Insteon (and most dual-band, which actually works quite reliably). I have a few things installed in my house now, which while they are part of an "automation system" I'm not sure I'd call it a "smart home":

* Keypad by the front door
* Has a button that both shows if the garage door is opened/closed and can open/close it
* Has an 'all off' that turns off the kitchen / living room lights
* Can control the outside soffit plug for x-mas lights
* Outside lights
* Turn on to 50% when it gets dark (ISY99 controller that automatically accounts for DST changing of daytime throughout the year), turn off at midnight
* Quickly go to 100% when there's motion outside, OR if the garage door is open, anytime when it's dark out
* All transitions fade: eg, After motion stops, they take ~1min to slowly fade from 100% back to 50%. This is subtle and just a nice touch that's easy because of the system
* Kitchen keypad has 'bright', 'dim', and 'off' buttons, which control the lights over the island, sink, range hood and under-cabinet.
* There's also a button used to indicate if the garage door is open, so we can see from the back half of the house

I haven't installed it yet (change of season made it not important now) but I will be adding a keypad to the bedroom to control the fan/lights. Right now there's just one switch and if you want fan/lights you have to pull the chains. During the summer we are constantly walking into the dark room, turning the switch, and all that happens is the fan turns on.

I think for me, a lot of the use case behind using insteon, is less about 'automation' and more about being able to make virtual 3/4/5-way switches and scene-based lighting without having to rip apart drywall and rewire.

Heck, one really convenient thing is that the switch in the living room controls lights on the other side of the room -- without a plug-in module, I'd either have to adjust those lights manually (meaning they'd be left off and/or on all the time), have an extension cord running in front of my fireplace, or open up drywall to rewire. I didn't build the house or choose to make the switch operate a plug on the same wall 6ft away, but at least I can make our lives easier with very little effort.

A lot of this is really just laziness in way, but at the same time, when you have to use 4 different controls in the kitchen to get all the lights on/off you simply don't turn them on and/or leave them on most of the time. One button gets better use of what's there, and just makes life a tiny bit more pleasant.

----

One thing I really don't get is the fascination with using smartphones to control. I've tried it, I just don't find it useful or convenient. Assuming I have my phone on me (I don't always, while at home), I have to take it out, swipe to unlock, wait a second for it to load, find the control app, wait a second for it to load, find the lights/scene I want, then change it. How the hell is that more convenient than the switch/keypad that's always on the wall right next to the door that I walk by as I am coming into the room? Seriously, I don't understand.

This whole 'you can control the lights from anywhere' thing is just a non-existent use case, as far as I'm concerned. We accidentally leave the lights on maybe a handful of times a year.. that is not a primary case of why to install these types of systems. I haven't even had my system exposed to the internet for the last couple years (changed my router, and never set up port forwarding again) because I NEVER used it remotely.

----

I have a wifi-connected thermostat, which is great for exactly 3 reasons: It is miles easier to program than the cheap piece of crap it replaced; I have a linux cron job that turns on the fan a few times through the day that greatly helps balance out the temperature (otherwise the back of the house facing the

Two Things Only

[jamesl]

I want a home that cooks and cleans. Cooks and cleans. I can take care of the rest.

Re:Two Things Only

[vlad30]

I want a home that cooks and cleans. Cooks and cleans. I can take care of the rest.

you know they already invented that, the only payment is you gotta ram your dick into their pussy from time to time.

Basement dwelling slashdotters have that already including laundry and ironing and they shouldn't be doing that second bit to their mum

Re:FOOD

[Anrego]

Ah, the old "smart fridge" fad.

For my use case, this would be impractical, as I tend not to have many "staple" foodstuffs and tend to shop for the meal(s) I intend to make in the near future, and I've usually got a good idea of what's in the fridge.

Back when "fridges with screens that will manage your grocery list for you" was being talked about a lot, some people described situations where it could be helpful, but they all seemed to involve adopting a very rigid protocol around fridge use ("remember to punch in the percentage of ketchup remaining when you are done with it Billy!", to which my response was "screw that shit".

I am going to live in the dumbest home

[FudRucker]

i am basically going to buy one of those big fancy storage buildings that dont have plumbing or electric installed, park it on some land in a secluded spot out in the middle of nowhere, buy some insulation and sheetrock, and some wiring 12vdc and fix it up with solar panels, but i am only going to run automotive grade stuff, like a AM/FM/CDplayer made for a car for a home stereo unit, 12 volt DC lights, etc... and use solar panels to keep a bank of batteries charged up, i am going off the grid (mostly) soon, i got to cut my living expenses or end up living on skidrow with the rest of the homeless, i already am working on drawing up plans for solar heated water and a composting latrine (all legal too)

Re:I am going to live in the dumbest home

[Sri Ramkrishna]

Make sure you also write a manifesto and grow your beard.

what companies/the NSA wants from smart homes

[Anonymous Coward]

That's great! Now that we know what people want from smart homes, here is the matching list of what major corps / the NSA wants from smart homes:

* Knowing when you are home or away (43%)
* Being able to monitor and data-mine any in-house audio (88%)
* Locking down your stove/microwave into a "pay per cooking-minute plan" (55%)
* Facial recognition of your real-life friends network (66%)
* Ability to turn on any web cams remotely for terrorist protection (51%)

I predict one of these groups will get their wishes...

secret passages

[Sri Ramkrishna]

I want a home with secret passage ways.

Just one thing

[sjames]

I want a candelabra. When I turn the switch on, gas jets should light the candles. When I turn the switch off, a snuffer should put them out.

But I'm not willing to spend the kind of money it would take for a novelty item, so I guess nothing.

Selfish?

[gstoddart]

Environmentally friendliness came in at only 11%. Note that the three most voted choices have direct advantages for the user, as opposed to Environmental Friendliness, which is primarily a societal benefit.

So, in other words, the smart home is a self-indulgent thing, then?

What would you look for in a smart home?

Privacy and freedom from external entities having analytics data about how I live in my home.

Pretty much the exact opposite of what the people pitching the smart home want. Google and Nest and all of these other companies want access to your data, not to make your life any better.

Sorry, but I don't trust the players enough to care about the game.

Who asked?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nobody asked for a "smart home". Or a self-driving car. Or phones that track us. Or cameras on every corner. Or internet activity records. Or the smart TVs and appliances with mics that will record our coversations (it's in the EULA for smart TVs - "be careful what you say around our TV") NO ONE asked for these things. They are being rammed into us.

Re:Who asked?

[Gavagai80]

Lots of us ask for self-driving cars. The rest perhaps not.

Re:Who asked?

[Khashishi]

Speak for yourself. I want a smart home and self driving car.

Status Updates

[cdu13a]

Pretty much all that I want from a smart home, is the ability to be notified if things break or go wrong when I'm not there.

I couldn't care less about anything else, I just want to know when I need to get my ass home to fix something, or deal with a disaster.

Being able to get a notification as soon as the freezer fails, or the sump pump fails, or the furnace fails would make a big difference in just how shitty your day is going to end up being.

smarttv will be the control hub

[cheekyboy]

As smart tvs get better and more capable, built in wifi/bt android OS etc...

They will be the control hubs of the home, they will IP chat to your consoles, or PCs, or wifi lights, anything. Even running the apps when tv is off (no power even, with 2 AA batteries to keep running during outages/storms)

Of course the korean companies will all talk to each other. Sony will make something totally custom and 3x the cost.
China will make it on every tv, but with poor security.

Shitty Website Alert!

[Zynder]

What a shitty website. It's like Windows 8 threw up all over it. I'm sure these are probably neat devices but I'll be damned if I could tell anything from that website. It's unusable!

Re:Shitty Website Alert!

[Noah Haders]

dude that's the new style for internet start up sites. stop being old.

Re:Unlike "smart" TVs

[ledow]

Personally, my first thought is "control".

When I don't want something to happen, I don't want to be overridden... ever.

When I do want something to happen, I want it to happen, no matter what.

The problem I see with smart homes, and automation in general, is that we're considered too stupid to have control of such a complex system, so we don't get it.

With control can come reliability. If I can control what stays up and what doesn't in a power cut, that's useful to me. If the lights stay on but the heating goes off, that's useless if I'm in the middle of winter.

Control can be opposed to security, if the system design is that awful. Most smart home gadgets I see rely on some remote control or RF control and that's just asking for trouble. Authenticate me, then give me control.

And you can't have evolving security without software upgrades unless you literally air-gap everything.

However, I agree with the sentiment of your last paragraphs. Controlling some LED light is the domain of a GBP10 kit from Amazon. GBP20 if you want wifi. Tying the home into the Internet for things like smartphone control brings enormous security and reliability problems (my friend has a NEST fire alarm... it has to talk home to Google).

But the real "smart" functionality either comes from contorl of things I'd rather have control of (temperatures, timings, etc.) or something that we just don't see - automation of manual tasks.

Automating the lights to come on is a parlour trick that anyone with a GBP20 gadget could do from the other side of the world. Automating the dishwasher to load and wash the dishes itself is something you could put into every home, smart or not. Just have a "dirty plate" box and let it work out how to get them into the washer and wash them and check whether they are clean yet.

We're decades, if not centuries, from that level of automation being mainstream.

I programmed an automation system

[msobkow]

I programmed an automation system for a 1.5 million dollar house a few years back. The owner spent gobs of money running extra wiring from every light, outlet, and socket to the central control circuit panel that ran most of the functionality. They sprang for 4 CAT6 lines to each room, with a fiber drag to supplement "future expansion", all of which ran to a router in the basement (Cisco, no less) and to a PBX system.

After the whiz-bang wore off in a month, the owner really regretted spending close to $150,000 on the automation. In the end, the only thing even his wife really liked was the automated drape controls and the cameras monitoring the property. All the fancy light dimmers and thermostats were more of a pain to use and set up than their analogue counterparts, and the remote was so complex that they didn't use it at all because it was far easier to just walk to the wall controller and use that.

Automation has always been more of a whiz-bang for a select few than a real necessity for anyone. For the most part, having tri-wired switches with switches at each of the two entries to a room is more than adequate for "automation."

The owner's kids absolutely hated the automation -- it was impossible to sneak in late at night without all the lights coming on and alerting Mom and Dad to just how late it was when they got home. :D

Don't think for me.

[Controlio]

The reason I don't own Nest or any other "learning" gear is two fold. First, I don't want any third party to know my settings and be able to deduce when I'm home. Second - and more importantly - I don't want my devices to "think" for me.

I keep a very irregular schedule that is the polar opposite of my wife. I work nights, she works days. My work nights vary wildly (I'm a contractor), hers do not (minus holidays or professional development days). Any "learning" a thermostat does in our household will be wrong.

For this purpose, I homebrewed a thermostat. I have an Omnistat with serial control, and I wrote a Raspberry Pi interface to talk to it. I then wrote an Android app to interface to the Raspberry Pi, so I can control the thermostat from inside the home or outside.

Why did I go to all of that trouble? Because there is no product on the market that fits my two criteria - no outside party data collecting, and no "thinking".

Seriously, why is this so hard? I understand the want to make things simple for the non-techies out there... but why in the world can't you offer me the option to strip everything away and use the thermostat in the simplest manner possible?

I'm having the same problem with lighting control right now. I would like a GPI contact closure to turn on/off an LED light dimmer, but never inhibit its ability to be turned on locally. You may say "Z-Wave!" or any of the other RF controls out there. The problem is that none of these meet my criteria for dimmable LED lighting: the fact that I hate software dimmers, and the ability to turn on/off a light to the set dim point without being able to inhibit the light from being turned on locally. All I want is a physical dimming slider and an on/off switch - not a software dimmer that gradually fades the output up and down and that you have to stare at LEDs to set once the unit is on. If I can't hit the switch and have an instant on with 100% certainty at what dimming level the light will pop on at, I don't want it.

My next house project will be a low voltage relay to grab the sunrise/sunset times, and turn my exterior LV lights on at sunset + 30min, and off at sunrise - 30min. Nothing outside of a photosensor does that now, and it doesn't do it reliably (think cloudy days, snow cover, etc). So I will homebrew it. And be happy.

Give me total control of my devices, with no "thinking" whatsoever. That's all I want in home automation. No one is doing that right now, and it frustrates me to no end.