The Internet of Things is one of our favorite trends at RWW. When it finally becomes ubiquitous, we’ll be that hipster blog that liked IoT before it was cool. To help usher in the future, the Danish Alexandra Institute has just released a comic book called “Inspiring the Internet of Things,” which explains the benefits of networking everyday objects – as well as the ethical issues – through 15 illustrated scenarios. The PDF version is available for free download.
“We need a new medium to communicate the idea of the Internet of
Things, its challenges, its problems
and its benefits; encouraging people
to think about this new disruptive
technology,” writes Mirko Presser of the Alexandra Institute. “This ‘comic book’ is aimed at everybody.”
This comic book isn’t the first public awareness effort for the Internet of Things. We covered a great 5-minute video from IBM that describes a future “global data field” driven by sensors and networked objects. IBM told us more about its plans for smart cities at Web 2.0 last week.
Xerox is also looking at these problems. They even sponsored a RWW post about it. But tech behemoths are not the only ones in this game. There are also small startups working on the Internet of Things.
So where is it? Why isn’t the Internet of Things cool already? What’s not cool about fridges, lights and toasters that talk to your phone and your car? The answer is “nothing.” Nothing is not cool about the Internet of Things. The idea must seem geeky to the average person, or something. Well, geeks, that’s why we run the world.
Do you see the benefits of an Internet of Things? Or would you rather your fridge and your bathroom scale remain dumb? Share your thoughts in the comments.
