back to article Google-owned smart-gumble-maker Nest snubs Google's smart-gumble OS Brillo

Smart-tech poster child Nest has revamped two of its three products and updated its app to better integrate all three. At a launch event on Wednesday in San Francisco, CEO Tony Fadell said his company's products would be "doing more together than they can independently." A slimmer, better Nest Protect smoke and carbon …

  1. Fazal Majid

    Protecting users' privacy?

    "the company has worked hard to make simple while protecting users' privacy"

    That's pretty rich when coming from a company owned by Google, the creepiest and most privacy-invasive firm there is. I had considered a Nest thermostat a couple of years ago, but their acquisition by Google was an absolute deal-breaker. As for paying $200 to let Big Brother inside your house, that's merely adding insult to injury.

    1. Thorne

      Re: Protecting users' privacy?

      There is a difference between privacy and anonymity. Google is an advertising company and simply can't function with total privacy. They make the best search engine and do a lot of other stuff. Yes they collect a lot of personal data but people don't look at that data, only robots.

      Yes they might get your thermostat data and usage patterns but what will they do with it? Only logical things I can think of is to make the thermostat more efficient, perhaps generate load demands for energy companies.

      Privacy went out the window as soon as the NSA slurped everyone's phone records and metadata. Anonymity is all we have left (short of living off the grid in a cave)

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Protecting users' privacy?

      "the creepiest and most privacy-invasive firm there is"

      Oh boy ... seriously? Where have you got that data from? Apple, Microsoft? Google have never pretended anything other then they use profiling to try to serve relevant ads (rarely do I see any relevant ads myself). However so do Amazon and eBay which I actually find much more of a pain. My amazon homepage is full of products I was interested in years ago and have since bought or not looked for since. However the whole front page on eBay has listings for them. I can buy a product from Amazon but (if not blocking) then have adverts for the same things from Amazon all over the net for weeks.

      Your credit card company knows loads about you, your bank knows even more, you insurance company sells your actual details to a claim firm as soon as you ring them after having an incident. Even registering to vote in the UK, a legal obligation, means you have to be careful that you aren't put on a marketing list with your details sold off - with the new electronic registration they can keep adding you onto that marketing list unless you keep opting out. Apple and Microsoft collect as much information as they can about you, so does nearly every company whose website you visit. Many websites that use a CMS like sitecore profile every click you make on a page to and store that profile using a cookie on your PC and then attempt to link you to other devices you may use.

      At the very least Google does do some things to try to protect your privacy. Is does not sell you actual details to third parties. It won't pass on your referrers in normal analytics. It won't allow unique IDs generated from your website that can identify the user to be used as a token for universal analytics. They 'appear to' try to secure your information in transit from both 'hackers' and the Government.

      They have so much oversight that doing something really stupid with your data is way too much risk for their core business. The best thing is, is you can make an informed decision - use their services or not based upon whether a free service is worth giving out an advertising profile for. I would also expect that a home web cam from a Google aligned company is more likely to be secure than one from a white-label far east manufacturer. Many webcams have gaping holes that there are websites where anyone can go and watch someone's house just by clicking a link - now that's creepy.

      1. Sandtitz Silver badge
        Stop

        Re: Protecting users' privacy?

        "At the very least Google does do some things to try to protect your privacy"

        Did Google really try to protect our privacy when the Street View cars sniffed all that wifi data?

        1. Thorne

          Re: Protecting users' privacy?

          Your wifi was publically broadcasting

  2. Mark 85

    Discount for a working smoke alarm?

    Hmm.. interesting that they've pulled this one off since most states (US) require smoke alarms in homes.

  3. AMBxx Silver badge
    Thumb Down

    CO Detector

    Most households with CO problems from boilers (furnace in the US) aren't going to be able to afford to spend this much on a detector.

    Toys for people with too much time and money.

    We have a CO detector in a room heated by a wood burner. Cost about £20. Makes a dreadful noise (only in testing, never gone off in anger). Not sure a notification to my phone would be heard over the alarm!

  4. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge

    There's an inherent contradiction in all this

    To make these systems accessible to the average user who just wants plug'n'play they need to work without requiring inbound connections to your home network from the internet, with all the security and dynamic-IP hassles that brings.

    The solution they all adopt is to have the devices call back to a server for instructions, and the user then logs into that server, via browser or an app, to do the config.

    All OK today, but:

    Taken altogether, these latest revamps and iterations continue to keep Nest ahead of its growing competition in the smart-tech market.

    so in 10 years time the new Nest devices will look nothing like the current ones, and any software to control the current ones will be obsolete. Does this mean that I will have to constantly upgrade my thermostat to the latest model ust to make sure it can still talk to the controlling server? I have an MP3 and streaming audio player that I bought maybe 10 years ago. It still works, but the server that supplied the radio stream info closed years ago. To get it to work I have to host a fake server on my home system.

    Replacing bits of a HiFi every 5-10 years is something a non-technical user may be prepared to do, but I'm sure as hell not going to replace my home heating system that often. Maybe every 20-30 years when I have to replace the boiler, but no sooner.

    All this stuff is just unnecessarily complex for the simple job of household automation. It may have a place in a business environment where refurbishment of offices every 10 years is normal. I can't help but think there'll be a flurry of early adopters of this, followed by disillusionment and decline into obscurity.

  5. Irongut

    "it can tell the Nest thermostat to shut off the furnace... shut off the fan"

    What kind of home has a furnace and a fan for heating? That sounds more like a factory or office building to me. Do they do anything that works with a boiler and radiators, maybe for about a tenth of the ridiculous price they currently charge?

    1. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge

      What kind of home has a furnace

      An American one, it's US-speak for a central heating boiler (because US CH often circulates hot air and not hot water)

      1. John Gamble
        Headmaster

        " ... it's US-speak for a central heating boiler ... "

        Well, no, because in US-speak a boiler... boils. My building is heated by steam that is created in a boiler.

        A furnace heats air directly.

    2. Dan Paul

      @Irongut Do you even understand.....

      what most heating systems are in the USA where the NEST is designed? That why he spoke about the common use of furnaces. RTFM for details how the nest works with boilers, all thermostats that are programmable usually do.

      FWIW the NEST is way over priced and there are plenty of products that work similarly.

      Most homes here in the US have a forced air furnace unless in the far north where there are numerous boilers.

      When the average temp is in the 60+F range, many homes in the deep south don't even have official heating systems.

      What most heating systems here have in common here is Conditioning which uses air not water so fans are required and those with boilers use separate systems for AC if they even have it.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    2 year payback? Mine was less than a year.

    My wireless thermostat broke, and world have cost over a hundred quid for a 1970s style wallbox. Nest was a no brainer, the claims of 2 year payback are sound. Mine would have done so, but because it was effectively half price, its payback was 1 year.

    It's an incredibly smart. My house feels warmer but uses less energy.

    1. Mark 85

      Re: 2 year payback? Mine was less than a year.

      Nice recommendation and result. This might have more value to us if you weren't posting as AC. Otherwise, I'd say you were in the employ of NEXT or Google.

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