The Jetsons Fallacy: How I Learned the Smart Home Industry Needs Change

I imagine as wireless technologies improve we'll see a reduced barrier to entry.

I remember as a kid having to run downstairs to grab the hardwired phone. Then we got wireless ones (one for downstairs and one on the second line for my dads office). Then we got wireless ones in every room of the house.

Now in my house we don't have a single one, we have cell phones.

Computers followed the same trend in my parents house too. We ended up with 3 desktops and a laptop, from our beginnings with an old IMB running DOS.

Now I have one on my phone I carry everywhere.

We're now seeing cable companies releasing boxes that stream TV over wifi. We've got chromecast.

It honestly looks like the "smart home" market is too growth stagnant that technology is going to supplant it.

Markets are supposed to grow, but I've been hearing of "Jetson" homes since I was a kid and it never came true.

All it needs is a plug-and-play system that anyone can install and the market would see an explosion.

I've got a couple of wireless light switches in my house, which given enough frequencies could be used to do remote switching of every light in your house from a central transmitter.

Without intervention this is going to be one of those "singularity techs" where all the parts just converge on this use from the existing divergence of other technologies.

This is our first post in a series about the promises of the Jetsons smart home, and how the industry is missing the mark.

Our next in the series will talk about what Astro is doing to change that.

Looking forward to hearing from the community!

Great post! Looking forward to the next one!