The Digital Dress Code
Coming to an office near you. If you thought the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) craze was a headache, just wait until button cameras, smart watches, and spy glasses (already here) are a daily occurrence in the office. Workplace #wearables will be a huge challenge in the coming years as more devices, clothing and pretty much any 'thing' with a chip or sensor become commonplace in our society. The device explosion with IoT (Internet of Things) will be much larger than any of these mobile phones we carry around. A couple new reports examine the impact of IoT on businesses. PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) released a report on wearable technology after surveying 1,000 consumers, 314 of which use some form of wearable, as part of "The Wearable Future" report. Some key findings included that 77% of respondents thought that a top benefit of wearable technology is the potential to make employees more productive and efficient. Honestly, when I read that I immediately thought of my boss's hologram standing behind me in my home office watching my work. 70% expect that their office should allow the use of wearables...probably the same folks who wanted to bring their own tablet and 46% felt that organizations should fund wearables rather than the dreaded BYOD. The idea is that if the technology is simple to use and integrates with other devices, that should boost productivity and lift profits. Even so, there needs to be significant investment to ensure the camera shirt buttons can talk to Exchange, ya know. The biggest concerns, according to PwC, include the risk of security breaches, invasion of privacy, tech dependence, having too many devices and on a more human level, not being able to relate to others or simply looking silly with all those attachments. PwC also looked at the industries that will capitalize on the wearable market. Entertainment will be more 'immersive and fun'; Social Media gets more real time updates from your clothes; Gaming can be more visually and physically engaging; Advertisers will want the space on your back; Healthcare will track your vitals; and Retail could offer “pleasant, efficient” shopping experiences. Business Insider recently released a report looking at the device growth They feel that by 2019, IoT devices will more than double the size of the smartphone, tablet, PC, wearable and connected car combined. That's huge. All the software, hardware, maintenance and management of IoT could add $1.7 trillion to the global economy by 2019. They also feel that the main benefit of IoT will be the efficiencies and cost savings by giving the user more control. But, there are sill few standards and even less compatibility so that needs work, not to mention the security risks inherent in these nouns. The processing power, storage, cameras, sensors and everything else will far surpass the USB-stick risks of years past, plus the potential of all this corporate data getting stored in personal clouds could spell big trouble. And how are all these nouns going to found on the internet? DNS of course! Once all these various wearables hit the office, DNS will be the thing that allows us people to find them threads. I truly feel that DNS will be one of the most strained technologies as more connections happen in the office and will be discussing this trend at the ThingsExpo - which is part of SYS-CON Media's CloudExpo in Santa Clara this week. ps Related: Employees Excited, Concerned About Wearables in the Workplace Medical Devices: Safeguarding the Healthcare Revolution How Smart, Connected Products Are Transforming Competition The 'Internet of Things' Will Be The World's Most Massive Device Market And Save Companies Billions Of Dollars As Wearables Get Hot, These 6 Industries Are Poised to Capitalize Why the Internet of Things will turn data computing on its head My Sensored Family The Internet of...(Drum Roll Please)...Band-Aids?!? The Breach of Things Technorati Tags: iot,things,wearables,workplace,sensors,silva,devices,byod,smart,f5,big data,privacy Connect with Peter: Connect with F5:Internet of Food
For those of you who like to post food pictures, this is something I can see being a benefit. Smart Chopsticks! Yup, you heard that right. Soon you'll be able to poke that dim sum and know if the food is tainted. Baidu, China's internet giant, unveiled them at their annual conference last week. While not ready for the mass market, Baidu says the chopsticks can detect oils containing unsanitary levels of contamination. They predict that you'll be able to detect the origin of oil and water and other foods...and whether they’ve spoiled and their nutritional content. You can hook them up to a smartphone to capture the content. They have a video which shows them dipping the chopsticks in olive oil and getting a 'good' reading and then doing the same with recycled oil and getting a 'bad' reading. As of today, the chopsticks only measure the freshness of cooking oil but future chopsticks also will be able to measure PH levels, temperature and calories. Of course I did a little digging to see what other utensil type things have gotten smarter. At CES 2013, Hapi Labs shared their Hapi Fork. A little bigger that your regular fork but after a charge, it'll monitor how many bites of food you take and at what rate. If you try to stuff your mouth with more than 1 bite every 10 seconds, the fork will vibrate to tell you to slow down. With USB, you can upload the data to track your eating or share with friends along with the plate in front of you. How about an instrument which tells you when you're about to bite the inside of your mouth? Then we got the Smart Cup, which counts the number of liquid calories you are two-fisting. Vessyl is a cup designed to automatically determine what’s been poured into it and track what you’re drinking in real-time. Whatever you pour into it, coffee, soda, juice, the sensors break it down to the molecular level to identify the beverage. It can even differentiate brands. Imagine the Pepsi Challenge in the one of these. It gives calorie count plus total grams of sugar, fat, protein, sodium and caffeine. You then connect to the app and it stores the drink along with making suggestions on healthier choices. Bad Bourbon...but so good. I know there are already smart refrigerators but I wonder what they'll be in the future. I was thinking about a fridge that had Rubik's cube type inside and based on whatever the sensors pick (smelly, past date, UPC, recall, whatever), those cubes move to the front so you can see what's about to spoil or needs to be eaten. How many times have you pulled a few things out and suddenly seen the science experiment covered in plastic wrap? This Internet of Things is branching in so many directions and it's interesting, at least to me, just how many items are starting to get sensors. The food supply has had it's share of recalls, contaminations, cover ups and other challenges and smart utensils really could be a life saver for some people, especially with food allergies. For me, it would be pretty cool to stick some food to find out if there is any lactose in it and then predict how soon I'll be bending over in stomach pain. That's smart. ps Related: 'Smart Chopsticks' Can Detect Bad Food Is Your Food Safe? New ‘Smart Chopsticks’ Can Tell Vessyl: A Smart Cup That Counts Liquid Calories CES 2013: Smart Utensils Remind You to Chew Your Food Is IoT Hype For Real? Internet of Things OWASP Top 10 Welcome to the The Phygital World Technorati Tags: iot,things,chopsticks,utensils,smart,sensors,nouns,silva,f5,food Connect with Peter: Connect with F5:
