I recently wrote about my experience at the Internet Retailer Conference + Expo (IRCE) 2015 and a presentation on the Internet of Things (IoT). My posting discussed where I saw confirmation of his position, that consumers want experiences and are willing to participate in IoT for those experiences. If you haven’t read it, here is the link Internet of Experiences. Today I read an article by an editor at InfoWorld stating that IoT (or IoE) is over before it began, article here The Internet of things is already losing steam.
I think the article makes some good points, especially around experiences. The author, Galen Gruman, makes the following points:
New data market researcher Argus Insights shows how dramatic the falloff in interest — and the rise in frustration — has become. Consumer interest in home automation has dropped 15 percent versus a year ago, moving in the opposite direction of the vendor and media hype.
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I recently got the RainMachine sprinkler controller ….
Considering the poor, VCR-like designs on standard sprinkler controls, a modern UI has big appeal.
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Despite their flaws, all my choices are useful, and they don’t depend merely on laziness (“control everything from your couch!”) to justify their existence. They actually try to apply intelligence to the environment they manage, which is supposed to be the point of the Internet of things. All my devices work with iOS and Android and have some on-device controls, and none requires a hub or other proprietary ecosystem to be in place.
But they are the exceptions, and that’s a big part of why people are losing interest in IoT. Unless something changes, IoT is destined to follow the “digital living room” (remember that from a decade ago?) into oblivion.
Galen finishes with the key message, vendors can’t expect consumer to acquire infrastructure just for their products. I owned an Apple Newton so I speak with some experience. Until manufactures focus on simplicity and where their products fit in consumer’s life, adoption will be hampered.
