back to article Intel imagines chips in nappies to create the Internet of sh*t things

If you think the Internet of Things (IoT) is a steaming pile of you-know-what, Intel's kind-of confirmed your suspicions by backing a team that's imagined an internet-connected nappy (diaper for North American readers). Computex 2015 is full of folks spruiking the internet of stuff. On the show floor you can hardly move for …

  1. This post has been deleted by its author

  2. andreas koch
    FAIL

    any parent

    who thinks that this is a good idea should be f***ed back themselves and aborted...

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: any parent

      At least the kids can express their contempt for it in the most direct way possible.

      Also, do each of these sensors have their own I-Pee address?

      I'll get me coat...

  3. Mark 85
    Coat

    My first thought is... you got to be shitting me... Then it was: what problem is this a solution for? Usually little sprog will utilize some verbal skills at the top of their lungs as well as assault your nose.

    Then it hit me.... IoS.... NSA... data slurp (or crap slurp). If you take too long to get to said sprog, Child Protective Services will show up at your door.

    Thus the answer: Someone is ACTUALLY thinking of the children when it comes to the cyber world!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! bwahahahahaha.....

    I'll go quietly.. there's two men outside the door with a 60 extra long jacket for me...

  4. Pete 2 Silver badge

    At last!

    A real-life implementation of Sturgeon's Law

  5. drand
    Stop

    Sometimes...

    ... you'll be pleased it's only brown. Heaven help you when you get a 'CODE GREEN.. POSSIBLY WITH BITS IN' and a buffer overflow onto the carpet.

    1. chivo243 Silver badge
      Facepalm

      Re: Sometimes...

      Exactly, I guess the author hasn't changed a diaper in a while? I seem to remember discovering new colors of the spectrum when changing/cleaning up the boy. I do remember one "stack overflow" when we took a long trip in the car that made us roll down the windows in December. We got the SMS - a shitty mess stinkin....

  6. frank ly

    Future Proof

    "... there's a dual core Atom at 500Mhz in there, along with 1GB of RAM and 4GB of flash ..."

    That's so it can handle updates and upgrades for the entire leaky stage of the child's development.

  7. Anonymous Blowhard

    Two bit arithmatic should be enough

    Nothing

    Number One

    Number Two

    One and Two

    1. Anonymous Blowhard
      Headmaster

      Re: Two bit arithmatic should be enough

      I can't believe I misspelled "arithmetic"! I'll be drummed out of the pedant's union for this...

  8. toughluck

    Doesn't this violate RoHS?

    They were supposed to reduce the amount of hazardous substances in electronics, not replace them with other.

  9. Peter Gathercole Silver badge

    Two things

    Firstly, re. nappies and wet wipes.

    You young things got it lucky! My oldest was a child when disposable nappies were, well, crap, and it was still fairly normal to use towelling nappies with nappy pins and rubber pants. It would not surprise me if some of the older commenters were to tell me that even rubber pants were too new.

    And wet wipes. Well, a flannel and a bowl of water, which had to be changed after each nappy change was the order of the day. Wet wipes were a huge leap in convenience, so just think yourself lucky!

    Secondly, if the technology is disposable like the nappies, is there a problem with exhaustion of MAC addresses here? It they piggyback on WiFi, then there is a finite number of MAC addresses available, so unless they intend to re-use or rotate MAC addresses, this could lead to problems in the future. You would also want to make the things destruct once used to make sure that your bin full of dirty nappies don't give false readings. Maybe the wood derived chips that were in a story last week?

    If they're serious, they really ought to use some re-usable sensing and sending technology which was added to a nappy, but this would make it less of an IoT story.

    1. Peter Simpson 1
      FAIL

      Re: Two things

      Ahhh. Wet wipes.

      Amazing how useful they were, and yet, there was one company that didn't "get it".

      My favourites were J&J in the rectangular blue container, with the flip up lid. Easy to open one-handed, take a wipe off the top of the stack, utilize and discard. Nice and stable, so it didn't get knocked over.

      Then, there was the "yellow tube" company. My lovely wife, deciding to try something new (or because the J&J brand was out of stock), brought these home one day. It was the standard cylindrical container, with a small flip up lid, and the wet wipe protruding through a small hole. Seemed OK. Until, I tried to extract a wet wipe one-handed. Couldn't be done. Pull on the wet wipe, the container, not heavy enough to hold itself down against the friction in the dispensing hole. Other hand occupied, holding two legs and a poopy bottom suspended off the table. Finally managed to extract a wet wipe, by waving the container/wet wipe until the container went flying across the room.

      Bottom cleaned, new diaper installed, wet wipe container recovered, and words were had with the wife, explaining that the remainder of the container would not be used. Sometimes, the packaging is important.

  10. RyokuMas
  11. thomas k.

    new slogan

    A slight update to El Reg's slogan: "Biting the hand that feeds shIT."

  12. jake Silver badge

    Whatever.

    My kid, grandkids, nieces & nephews all somehow manage(d) to survive, despite low-tech cotton diapers/nappies.

    If you are an adult, the nose knows. Three-cornered pants are cheap, reusable, and easy to maintain. There is absolutely NOTHING that will make changing diapers/nappies "fun", but it's fairly easy to save a boat-load of money if you stick to the basics.

    One wonders if the genius at Intel has ever actually been in the position of spending a year or so taking care of an actual infant ...

  13. annodomini2

    Epitome of marketing and an attempt to breed ignorance

    Most of the current tweenie generation are glued to their phones, so in a very sick way this kind of make sense, marketing sense.

    Unfortunately the turd polishers, are attempting to rub too much of themselves into a product and are the epitome the ignorance of kids this product is attempting to breed.

  14. 45RPM Silver badge

    We always used reusable nappies with our tots. It wasn’t particularly onerous, and the smell of a used disposable is far worse than the smell of a washable waiting to be washed - so our bathroom was always a good deal more pleasant that the bathrooms of our disposable toting pals. With a paper liner, the turds can be hoofed straight into the crapper, and a washable wrap prevents any leaks. A absolute doddle. The big con is that disposables are somehow more convenient - which they aren’t.

    As for checking, there are occasions when the nappy might be soiled - but there’s no associated smell to warn the parent that mayhem has occured. This is more of a problem with reusables because they aren’t full of distressingly bad smelling chemicals. The child might not be bothered by the load - and hence no audible warning either. In this case, if there is cause to suspect I always used the mark 1 dipstick (otherwise known as an index finger). After all, if it comes out clean then theres no cause for concern - and if it comes out wet or brown then you were going to have to change the nappy (and hence wash your hands) anyway.

  15. John70

    Wonder if it sells well if Apple create iNappy and link it to the iPhone.

    1. Picky

      With a Golden Shower version?

    2. Trigonoceps occipitalis

      Wonder if it sells well if Apple create iNappy and link it to the iPhone.

      Only once they've redesigned the interface and iBabies have three legs - a 50% improvement over the old model.

  16. Bogle
    Joke

    WiFi

    My little one broadcasts on WiFi-y!

  17. This post has been deleted by its author

  18. Peter Martin
    Coffee/keyboard

    wonderful but dont read this during your lunch break bweerrrkk

    as per title

  19. Dan Paul

    Clueless tech for tech's sake

    This is the problem with the "IoT" (or Internet of Twits).

    These so called "Scientists" develop technology simply for the sake of technology.

    The human olfactory sense (along with all the other human senses) is all we need for child rearing and it will be a long time before anyone really duplicates it. And it doesn't take batteries.

    Putting sensor chips in a disposable diaper only serves to raise the cost and does nothing to rid humanity of the problem.

    Now creating something that lived in the human colon and completely ate all the various forms of excrement without causing any secondary condition, would be a real boon to humankind. No Waste Water treatment, toilets, TP or any other such nonsense. Just empty the pail of pellets into the composter and be done with it.

    Where are the geneticists when you need them?

  20. FozzyBear

    Seriously

    The last wisps of hope for humanity have now vanished with that story.

  21. Grom_uk

    Surely we are just talking about a standard nappy with two wires running down the center (under the surface) up to two pop buttons on the front where the notifier is clipped. Therefore the expensive bit is reusable. It also ties people in to using special expensive nappies.

POST COMMENT House rules

Not a member of The Register? Create a new account here.

  • Enter your comment

  • Add an icon

Anonymous cowards cannot choose their icon

Other stories you might like