Predicting Our Future

For most of human history, we’ve accepted that keeping a home clean and filled with essentials is a burden that we must bear. But are we on the cusp of witnessing a technological revolution where our homes will take care of themselves and manage our lives for us? In the final episode of a 7-part series on the future of the smart home, Andrew paints a picture of what life in our future homes might look like and explores how smart homes will use personas and Artificial Intelligence to fulfill our needs before we’re even aware of them. Listen for interviews with some of the foremost experts and innovators in this space, featuring Daniel Rausch of Amazon, Kit Klein of Wink, Scott Harkins of Honeywell, Sridhar Kumaraswamy of Philips Lighting, Jeff Patton of GE Lighting, Neil Orchowski of Lutron, Professor John Barrett of the Nimbus Centre at Cork Institute of Technology, and Cliff Rosen of Whole Home Control.

If you’re incredibly proficient at using your Amazon Echo, you might already being giving it directions to order more toilet paper or laundry detergent. But how long will it be before the home is communicating directly with Amazon or Walmart and it places an order with no verbal cue or even involvement from you? Will Amazon use their own delivery people to stock your refrigerator?

Interviewees

Over the past few years, the public has mostly come to associate the voice activation capabilities of Amazon’s Echo and Google Home with smart speakers. But in fact these devices and others like them can be viewed as Trojan Horses being used by the world’s biggest technology companies in the war of home operating systems. From devices like the Echo and Google Home, users are now able to control their thermostats, blinds, cameras, locks, and entertainments systems. Will the company that develops the winning operating system for the smart home enjoy similar monopolistic power to that of Microsoft with desktop computing in the 1990s or to the market share Android and iOS hold in mobile devices today? In the fifth episode of a 7-part series on the future of the smart home, Andrew analyzes the race between tech giants to develop an operating system for the smart home and artificial intelligence to change the way we live. Listen for interviews with some of the foremost experts and innovators in this space, featuring Daniel Rausch of Amazon, Kit Klein of Wink, and Cliff Rosen of Whole Home Control.

The most influential companies in lighting are reimagining one of the most fundamental features of our homes: the light switch. Will the smart home of the future understand our lighting needs without us needing to flip a switch? In the fourth episode of a 7-part series on the future of the smart home, Andrew explores whether there’s a place for light switches in the future of smart lighting and why the winner of the space is far from obvious. Listen to interviews with some of the foremost innovators in the smart lighting space, featuring Jeff Patton of GE Lighting, Sridhar Kumaraswamy of Philips Lighting, Neil Orchowski of Lutron, and Derek Richardson of Deako.

While Nest wasn’t the first company to offer a smart thermostat, its first product quickly developed rock star status. Nest helped turn the thermostat -- a relatively forgettable device -- into a sexy offering that made consumers excited about other devices that would be offered as part of the smart home. Honeywell, a company that has long dominated the traditional thermostat market, is now going head to head with Nest in selling smart thermostats. In the third episode of a 7-part series on the future of the smart home, Andrew examines how an industry titan is able to maintain its lead in the smart thermostat space and what this means for manufacturers of smart home devices in other verticals. Listen for an in-depth interview with smart home expert Scott Harkins, VP of the IoT Partner Programs within Honeywell’s Connected Home and Buildings group.

The David and Goliath story of startups entering an entrenched industry and disrupting its leading players isn’t a new one. Yet within the smart home space, an unlikely development has birthed a particularly startup-friendly environment. Crowdfunding websites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo have provided the right financing dynamics and access to early customers for startups to successfully launch smart home products. In the second episode of a 7-part series on the future of the smart home, Andrew investigates the evolving role of crowdfunding for smart home startups that have been making waves with innovative hardware devices. Listen for interviews with some of the foremost experts and innovators in this space, featuring Nayeem Hussain of Keen Home, Nils Mattisson of Minut, David Rabie of Tovala, and Christopher Calisi of Nightingale.

The idea of a home that can take care of its inhabitants has been around for over 100 years. But only in the last few decades have we seen technological breakthroughs that can make smart homes a reality. In the first episode of a 7-part series on the future of the smart home, Andrew traces the history of the smart home and presents a vision of its future as a multitude of devices are being connected to the Internet. To put the smart home in the context of the larger “Internet of Things” revolution, Andrew interviews one of the foremost IoT researchers and Head of Academic Studies at the Nimbus Centre at Cork Institute of Technology, Professor John Barrett.

In the United States, there are over 500,000 elected officials. In the overwhelming majority of elections, less than half of eligible voters participate, resulting in one of the lowest levels of voter engagement of any Western democracy. In this episode, Andrews asks and tries to answer: What can be done to increase turnout for elections conducted every year in the U.S.? Can the security risks of implementing online voting be overcome? If online voting did become available in the United States, what might it look like? Which companies would be the winners? In the third and final episode of a series on the future of online voting, Andrew interviews some of the foremost experts and innovators in this space, including Professor Dan Wallach, James Simmons of Everyone Counts, John Koza of National Popular Vote, Adam Ernest of Follow My Vote, and Antonio Mugica of Smartmatic.

In a 2016 testimony addressing the House Committee on Space, Science & Technology, Dan Wallach warned that the country’s voting infrastructure was vulnerable to hacking by foreign governments. Computer scientists have long spoken of the dangers of electronic voting machines, and now they’re warning against adopting online voting. But is there a fundamental difference in the way that academics and entrepreneurs approach the risks and benefits of online voting? How might the introduction of online voting change the way that we conduct American elections? In the second episode of a 3-part series on the future of online voting, Andrew investigates how online voting is already being piloted around the world and whether there are creative ways to approach the risks inherent in online voting by interviewing some of the foremost experts and innovators in this space, including Professor Dan Wallach, Professor David Dill, James Simmons of Everyone Counts, Jordi Puiggali of Scytl, & Antonio Mugica of Smartmatic.

In the 2016 U.S. presidential election, a little over a half of the voting age population cast their votes and the candidate who won the presidency lost the popular vote. Is the problem with low U.S. voter turnout due to culture or lack of accessibility? Without amending the U.S. Constitution, is there a way to use technology to improve voter turnout and overcome the effects of the Electoral College? In the first episode of a 3-part series on the future of online voting, Andrew explores the broken American election system and interviews some of the foremost experts and innovators in this space, including Professor David Dill, John Koza of National Popular Vote, Thad Hall of Fors Marsh Group, Professor Dan Wallach, & Antonio Mugica of Smartmatic.