Tech News and Commentary

Dave and the team discuss Facebook's three strikes rule, Lenovo's foldable PC, Google's loss in court over defective microphones, Alexa guard, Facebook profile options coming back, DJI's new action camera, new ad-types from Google, and more.

Mike in West Point, Mississippi listens on SuperTalk Mississippi and asked: "I got a notice through my Iris account that Iris is going to shut down and Lowes is going to stop carrying the Iris devices. Do you have a good way to transition since I have a tremendous amount of Iris devices?"

Mike, if you go by Lowes own website, it looks like the answer is right there: get rid of all your Iris devices.

The reason we say that is that Iris devices aren’t all compatible with more open standards like Z-Wave, and Lowes is exchanging some Iris devices for Visa gift cards.

Realistically, you won’t get back the money you put in, but since smart devices depend on other smart platforms, sooner or later they’ll stop working if their manufacturer isn’t there to keep them running.

As for what to replace them with, we’d bet on two things, either standards, so if a manufacturer goes out of business you can still use your devices with another one’s products, or big names. Alexa will probably stick around for a few years, Amazon has too much money and invested too much in the platform to let it go.

Since you say you have a tremendous amount of devices, the truth is that there are probably no easy solutions. You’re going to have to put in some work and money to get back what you’re about to lose.

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