Reply to post: IoT seems to be one Big Fail

Coming soon to smart home devices? Best Before labels – with patch cut-off dates

martinusher Silver badge

IoT seems to be one Big Fail

Most products have some kind of processor in them these days and somehow they get by without being patched every five minutes. There's actually a reason for this and its not just that 'they're too simple' or that 'they're not connected to the Internet'. IoT seems to be an accident waiting to happen, an accident caused by badly designed, constructed and implemented protocols using significant complexity to perform simple tasks. These protocols come about because of a combination of shortsighted engineering -- Web protocols are apparently all people know these days -- and the omnipresent marketing push to stick their nose into everyone's business 'the better to get to know them'.

This kludge may be why there's no huge rush to buy IoT devices. Its a bit like the early days of music players. A MP3 player is a simple thing but early designs were screwed up by a need to monetize the customer base (something only Apple really figured out how to do). Then, as now, customers are faced with an array of devices that cost a lot, don't do very much, are prone to be hacked and can have support withdrawn from them at a moment's notice. What's not to like about that?

(Incidentally, if you like remote on/off, dimmers and so on then you've been able to buy them for over 40 years as 'X10' devices. Hooking an X10 controller to a remote protocol is a no brainer.)

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