Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

English Man Spends 11 Hours Trying To Make Cup of Tea With Wi-Fi Kettle (theguardian.com)

Posted by msmash on from the all-things-wifi-enabled dept.

All data specialist Mark Rittman wanted was a cup of tea from his all new Wi-Fi kettle. Little did he know that the thing would take 11 hours for that. The issue, in the case of Rittman was, that the base station was not able to communicate with the kettle itself. According to The Guardian: A key problem seemed to be that Rittman's kettle didn't come with software that would easily allow integration with other devices in his home, including Amazon Echo, which, like Apple's Siri, allows users to tell connected smart devices what to do. So Rittman was trying to build the integration functionality himself. Then, after 11 hours, a breakthrough: the kettle started responding to voice control.

5 of 200 comments (clear)

  1. Re:This is why I'm no longer in tech. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Mine can do that - I press a button on it to tell it when I'm awake.

  2. Never ask a hobbyist why by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The inevitable question asked IoT tinkerers is : what's the point? Was it worth it? After three weeks of tinkering, and an ugly mess of arduinos, breadboards and wires, Now you can hit the snooze button on your analog clock with wifi, or now you can run ssh on a teletype machine. Why did you do it?

    The answer is usually : to see if I could.

    And I say God bless those nutters.

    1. Re:Never ask a hobbyist why by green1 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Well of course it is! Manufacturers discovered a long time ago, that even their cheapest quality stuff lasts too long and people don't buy new ones often enough. By internet enabling them, they can conveniently discontinue the server side support (which usually blocks all local functions as well) any time they need a new revenue boost and force people to buy new ones all over again.

  3. Re:The worst part by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I like the final tweet of his in the article.

    Well the kettle is back online and responding to voice control, but now we're eating dinner in dark while lights download a firmware update

    This should be the only response ever given when someone tries to sell IoT nonsense.

  4. Re:The worst part by Overzeetop · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It's rare to have a first post that can effectively be the last post. Today is the day you win the internet.

    --
    Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?