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| Thank you for your time, attention, and commentary! |
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| By Stacey Higginbotham |
Many of us are gathering with our loved ones this week over plates full of turkey, stuffing, and cranberry sauce. But even if you don't celebrate American Thanksgiving, the start of the holiday season is a good time to practice some gratitude as a bulwark against family drama, seasonal depression, and general anxiety.
With that in mind, I want to kick off this week's newsletter by telling y'all how grateful I am that y'all have stuck with me and Kevin over the years as we've talked about the internet of things, AI, connectivity, semiconductors, and smart home gadgets. We love doing this, and love that you, our readers and listeners, give us your attention and make it worthwhile for our sponsors to keep advertising with us. Indeed, advertisers, we thank you, too. |
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| — Kevin and I are still meeting over Meet, but maybe in the New Year we'll be able to hang in person again. |
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In the coming year, we're planning on some new coverage areas as we focus on AI, machine learning at the edge, and new architectures for the future of distributed computing. On the business side, I hope to bring y'all more stories about data ownership and the legal side of IoT because as the sector matures, debates over how to connect a sensor network will evolve into the best ways to protect and authenticate data while also sharing it with the appropriate partners.
I'm also looking for more stories about using IoT to reduce carbon footprint or innovations that help with increasing sustainability for connected devices. And in light of the climate change that's already wreaking havoc on our world, we'd be silly to ignore stories about how IoT and AI can help build resiliency into existing supply chains, operations, and transportation systems. Kevin's going to bring in some of the things he's learning about in his computer science master's program, and we'll probably talk a bit more about robots.
So stay tuned as we gear up for the coming year of IoT coverage. And thank you for helping us get this far. |
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| How to improve and track your home's air quality |
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If the pandemic was the big story of 2020, then climate change was the big story of 2021, with prolonged freezes in Texas, raging wildfires in California, and devastating floods in Europe. Yet even as more and more people wake up to the reality of a hotter world, we're apparently still not ready to pull out all the stops to prevent another half-degree rise in temperature. We are, however, increasingly looking for policies — and devices — that can mitigate the impact of climate change on an individual level.
As we've written, one of the biggest impacts of climate change is on air quality. I've spent the past few years playing with a variety of options designed to ensure clean air, from standalone air quality monitors for inside and outside the home, as well as air purifiers. It's a big area for investment. Even Amazon is releasing a smart air quality monitor, which will ship in early December. |
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| — A cluster of my indoor air quality monitors and purifiers. Image courtesy of S. Higginbotham. |
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So what factors should people take into consideration when trying to assess the quality of their indoor air, and how should they attempt to clean it if problems arise?
First, let's talk about measurement. When it comes to indoor air quality monitors, there are dozens of options out there. Generally speaking, they will track some subset of the following five things: temperature, humidity, non-volatile organic compounds (VOCs), particulates, and carbon dioxide. Some might also track carbon monoxide and radon.
These devices may also use their sensor data to create algorithms that will tell you the likelihood of mold growth or illness caused by poor ventilation. Some will track carbon dioxide, and will tell you when the air quality is no longer conducive to productivity (CO2 can make you sleepy). The caveat, however, is that everyone's algorithms are different, and while there is research about CO2 making people sleepy, those personalized CO2 trackers feel pretty gimmicky.
When looking for a tracker, it's worth noting what, exactly, it tracks. For example, I love my Awair Glow monitor, which tracks temperature, humidity, CO2, and VOCs, but after using it for a few years I realized that, other than opening a window, nothing I do will change the VOC reading. And even when I do open the window, that reading eventually shoots back up after closing it.
It's also worth knowing what today's filters are best at filtering. To address those persistently low VOC readings I would need an air purifier that uses an activated carbon filter to clean the air, but it looks like the most effective way to use it would be on a home HVAC system that vents air outside. There are a few air purifiers that use active carbon filtration, but I've not tested any except the Molekule, which was a total waste of money. It looked nice, though.
When it comes to climate change, the biggest culprit to bad indoor air is smoke from wildfires. Both this year and last year, we ran our air purifiers constantly, for days at a time, in an attempt to reduce the particulate matter in our house caused by wildfire smoke. I ran four different purifiers this year alone: an older Coway, a "smart" Coway, and two versions of the Filtrete Smart Air Purifier that uses the statically charged Filtrete filters.
As a result, I have the following suggestions. First up, if you or someone you live with has allergies and/or you live in a place prone to wildfires, you should have an air purifier. And that air purifier should have a HEPA filter and be sized appropriately for the room you want to clean.
If you don't live in an area with wildfires and are only dealing with allergies, I'd recommend running an air purifier (again sized for the room) for an hour before going to bed, max. For that use case, you don't need either an air quality monitor or a smart air purifier; all you really need are good HEPA filters. You don't need monitoring because allergens may not show up on the monitors. Concentration isn't the main problem here; rather, it's simply the presence of the allergen.
But if you also live in a wildfire-prone area or are super concerned with your indoor air quality because you cook a lot or use a wood-burning fireplace, get an air purifier with an internal monitoring feature. If you're feeling super nerdy, go ahead and spring for a filter with an app, although I don't think it's necessary. Smart purifiers have integrated monitors that track particulates and sometimes temperature or humidity as well.
For me, the best experience comes from setting these machines on automatic and letting them adjust to the filtration needs of the air around them. When in automatic mode, they quietly exchange air in the background, and when they sense particulates, they boost their air exchange to filter air more quickly.
In the case of the 3M's Filtrete line, if you've downloaded the app you can set it to notify you to turn the purifier on whenever it senses bad air. We use that feature with our largest purifier in the family room because generally the air in there is pretty good; we don't tend to run it in there unless the outdoor air quality is terrible or we are cooking. This saves us energy and a bit on the filter life. (Most machines run at an energy level that will add about $1 to $3 a month to your utility bill, depending on what your utility charges per kilowatt-hour.)
The 3M app also tells me the outside air quality and temperature (although it runs about 2 degrees off from other thermometers in the room). It lets me see trends, although I found I don't care to see them. In fact, without the ability to tie my temperature and humidity sensors into other apps, such as my HVAC, the external monitors are pretty useless.
The one exception to that is the Airthings Wave monitor that I put in a storage closet where the humidity is high and the temperature is cold. I worry about the likelihood of mold developing, so I keep the monitor there because Airthings has a mold assessment algorithm that I think might warn me if temps get too out of line. I used to have a Bluetooth version of the monitor but upgraded to a Wi-Fi gateway because Wi-Fi allows me to get notifications from anywhere as opposed to me actively walking by the area to check it every few days.
Finally, if you're going to buy a monitor, I recommend setting it up for notifications around specific parameters, especially those parameters you can change. If you can open a window to lower VOCs or carbon dioxide levels, then get a notification for when those are high and take action. But for the most bang for your buck, it's much nicer to have a monitor that's integrated with a device that can take action on your behalf. Because it's only through such integration that smart home devices actually become smart. |
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| Episode 348: We're thankful for smart cows |
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| Heading into the holiday weekend, Kevin and I share what we're thankful for (mostly y'all, our sponsors, each other, and Thread), while also talking about the sad sale of Tile to Life360. We also discuss Clevr, Qeexo, and efforts to make AI accessible to people who can't or don't want to code. After that, I discuss my desire for a new activity tracker and the rise of Wear OS. We also talk about a new HomeKit camera from Aqara that's pretty fancy without having a high-end price tag before diving into some of the financials and data from Samsara's IPO filing. |
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| — Smaxtec can track the health of cows for better milk and fewer farts. |
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| Our guest this week is Stefan Scherer, the CEO of Smaxtec, a company making health sensors for dairy cows. First, we learn a lot about cows and how to assess temperature, motion, and data on acidity from a cow's stomach and translate that into health metrics. Then we talk about the challenges of building a sensor that's rugged enough to last three to five years in a cow's stomach as well as the challenges of keeping such a device connected. With this data, farmers are able to track disease spread in dairy cows and prevent costly illnesses that could mean their milk gets tossed, while also tracking data that can help prevent cow farts from causing as much damage to the environment through the release of methane. You're going to learn a lot about cows and a lot about solving a connectivity problem I wouldn't wish on anyone. |
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This week on the IoT Podcast Hotline, we answer a listener question about the anti-drunk driving provision in the Build Back Better legislation.
The IoT Podcast Hotline is brought to you by Very. Very is a fully distributed IoT engineering firm that partners with clients to build systems for smart manufacturing, smart energy and utilities, consumer electronics, and connected wellness. Discover what our multidisciplinary teams can do at https://www.verypossible.com/services. |
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| News of the Week |
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GM is simplifying its chip supply chain: I think this is a smart move on GM's part and also an indication that as we put computers into more places, we need to consolidate platforms and simplify the underlying hardware and software. GM will co-develop chips with its suppliers as well as shrink the number of chip families it uses in its vehicles to three. It's unclear exactly what those families are, but it's a good plan. By reducing the number of chips and suppliers it works with, GM can buy chips in bulk and guarantee supplies better than a manufacturer that is buying fewer chips (say for one specific type of car). Doing so will also help GM pinpoint demand a bit better as it spreads the chips across better-selling vehicles and those that are in lower demand. All of this will help chip suppliers feel confident allocating production for GM's parts. (Automotive News)
Ford is doing...something to address the chip shortage: While GM was a bit light on the specifics of how it plans to address the chip shortage with regards to the types of chip consolidation it will enact, it managed to provide some details, such as its overall strategy and the names of its chip partners. Ford, which is also trying to soothe the market with its plans to address the chip shortage, was much less clear. It has signed some kind of partnership with chip manufacturing firm Global Foundries, but we're not sure what the partnership entails or how it will help. (Ars Technica)
No-code AI is becoming a thing: This week, Kevin showcased Clevr, a service that makes it easy to input images or text to train an AI model. It's part of a wave of low-code or no-code options out there designed to make machine learning more accessible for people who have an idea but don't know how to use Python or R. With more and more sources of information and a need to derive insights from expensive IoT deployments, no-code AI is another way to let more people participate in the next generation of technology innovation. (Stacey on IoT)
More trouble ahead for Nvidia's plan to buy ARM: The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has "expressed concerns" over Nvidia's $40 billion plan to buy chip architecture firm ARM. This isn't a surprise, especially since regulatory agencies in the UK, China, and the EU have all expressed concerns about the deal. Because ARM designs an architecture that underpins almost every chip used in a smartphone and many used in the IoT, regulators and ARM's customers are leery of a deal that would see Nvidia control that architecture. That's especially true given that ARM has clear designs in the computing and server market, where Nvidia is also trying to sell its chips. Nvidia had expected the deal to close in early 2022, but in a conference call this summer, noted it was taking longer than expected. If it doesn't close before the summer of 2022, ARM owner SoftBank gets to pocket a $1.25 billion breakup fee. (Protocol)
IoT platform Toit open sources its language: Is Toit the Kubernetes of the IoT? This August, I wrote about Toit, a company building software for the IoT that helps manage applications at scale. It's one of several companies that are building an alternative to containers for the embedded devices used in IoT deployments. This week, the company said it would open source its Toit programming language, which lets developers build software that can run efficiently even on small chips. (Medium)
This is definitely a buyer beware situation: I say this all the time, but with connected devices, you aren't buying hardware; you're buying software. This is hard for people who are used to paying for a device and having it work mostly as intended in some static form for the rest of the life of the device. But in IoT, that's not the case. If the company shuts down, your hardware might become a brick. If the company tweaks its business model, you might find yourself paying for features that used to be free. And in the case of NordicTrack X32i treadmill buyers, if you bought the device because it was easy to hack, that capability might one day disappear. NordicTrack customers apparently purchased the treadmill because it was easy to hack its 32-inch screen to play YouTube videos, Netflix, or whatever else they wanted in addition to NordicTrack classes. But a software update is breaking that feature and upsetting customers who paid $4,000 for a machine in part because they valued the ability to use its big screen to watch their own stuff. This is frustrating for the customers and not a great look for NordicTrack, and it just goes to show how far apart buyers and manufacturers are when it comes to understanding what a connected device actually is and how it should behave. (Ars Technica)
Another try for smart clothing: Over the years, Kevin and I have been excited by the potential and then disappointed with the limits of smart clothing. I've tried smart bras and smart socks, while Kevin has tried smart shirts. Each time, the potential to improve our form through tracking body movements or the ability to get detailed heart data has been cool, but not worth the high cost and frustration of charging the electronics that must be taken out before washing. But there's another smart clothing brand on the market now, and diehards may want to give it a shot. The UK startup Prevayl is coming to the smart clothing market with an attractive shirt and an approach aimed at hardcore fitness users who are also into biofeedback. I'll think of it as the Whoop contingent. (Engadget)
Another AI-based security startup for IoT has raised funding: Shield-IoT has raised $7.4 million in funding to help it build out sales and marketing. The four-year-old Israeli company differentiates itself from other startups using AI to detect anomalous behavior by saying it can do so at the scale of millions of devices. Doing anomaly detection can take time, especially as the number of networked devices grows (consider the difference between a lifeguard looking for someone drowning when there are four people in a pool vs. when there are 400). So instead of looking at individual behavior data, Shield-IoT builds a mathematical construct it calls a corset to shrink the data points in a way that doesn't lose any crucial information and then runs its anomaly detection algorithms against that. I'm intrigued. (VentureBeat)
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