As I said gobuchul, the actual application isn’t important in this case, it’s the process.

The man can’t even boil a kettle of water ffs, I’d be amazed if anyone wanted to employ him!

Pretty sure he can operate a kettle the normal way if he wants.

But because he’s done this and most likely a whole load of other things in the past, he’s become pretty damn good at solving difficult technical issues, which means he’s probably good at his job.

He’s good at taking a long time to solve a non-existent problem? Yes, I’m sure prospective employers will be breaking his door down.

Uh, the same skills also apply to real world problems obviously… 🙄

Uh, the same skills also apply to real world problems obviously…

So, assuming that he somehow developed the ability to work out what’s important, you’re saying that he might be good at taking a long time to solve real problems?

I’m with mol on this.

Obviously this tech is fairly pointless, but it is the step towards other things. Obviously he could have given up and got a normal kettle, but it is the puzzle of the thing and that gaining of knowledge that drives certain people.

I’d have done the same thing.

Mol’ i appreciate your pro-tech rant up there, well said.

but still, it’s a wifi kettle, ultimately pointless.

if the star of the twitter feed wants to test himself against a shitey wifi device, with the long term view of improving it’s unacceptably terrible performance, can i request he start with Pure’s Jongo/Connect system?

True intelligence isn’t spending half a day trying to get a WiFi kettle working.
True intelligence is realising you don’t need a WiFi kettle in the first place.

Obviously this tech is fairly pointless, but it is the step towards other pointless things.

FTFY

Why do things have to have a point? I don’t know why he decided to make a wifi kettle but if he made a challenge for himself and set out to learn the expertise and puzzled through the problem then I struggle to see that as a waste of time. I mean, a lot of people on here must ride bikes in the woods just for fun which doesn’t have a lot of “point” other than for fun…

I still don’t understand the point, explain it again

The post is not about the kettle – the kettle could be any number of voice activated internet connected widgets, doors, lights, a lift for a disable person etc etc.

It should be easy to connect internet widgets to each other. It isn’t, hence, #internetofshit instead of #internetofthings.

I mean, a lot of people on here must ride bikes in the woods just for fun which doesn’t have a lot of “point” other than for fun…

I don’t think anyone is arguing otherwise…

The post is not about the kettle – the kettle could be any number of voice activated internet connected widgets, doors, lights, a lift for a disable person etc etc.

Except it’s not about the useful things it COULD have been about, it’s about the pointless thing it is about

Except it’s not about the useful things it COULD have been about, it’s about the pointless thing it is about

Jaws is not about the shark.

“Pretty sure he can operate a kettle the normal way if he wants.”

So why didn’t he then? he wold have saved himself about 10 hours and 58 minutes, in which to do other, possibly even meaningful and useful, things.

“I mean, a lot of people on here must ride bikes in the woods just for fun which doesn’t have a lot of “point” other than for fun…”

Keeps you fit and healthy.

Wasting your life messing about trying to do something that doesn’t actually need doing, and has no actual benefit at all, to anyone, isn’t a healthy activity.

“True intelligence isn’t spending half a day trying to get a WiFi kettle working.
True intelligence is realising you don’t need a WiFi kettle in the first place.”

Word.

It should be easy to connect internet widgets to each other. It isn’t, hence, #internetofshit instead of #internetofthings.

Exactly and it won’t get easier until people like him (and me!) solve the problems and make it easier.

Lots of abstract physics and maths could likewise be described as pointless. Spend all day bending your head around the proof that 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 + 6 + … = -1/12 and you don’t even get a nice cup of tea at the end. 😉

But because he’s done this and most likely a whole load of other things in the past, he’s become pretty damn good at solving difficult technical issues, which means he’s probably good at his job.

hmmm. Somehow I doubt it. There are a lot of poor reviews for the iKettle on Amazon – but they all seem to focus on the rubbish design of the lid rather than any kind of networking or setup issue. I think this bloke is probably just not quite as clever as he thinks he is, and either hasn’t read the instructions properly, or somehow made the kettle incompatible with his network via some previous “tinkering” balls-up.

Making a problem massively more complicated than it needs to be, and then solving it, doesn’t make you smart IMO. 🙂

Keeps you fit and healthy.

Wasting your life messing about trying to do something that doesn’t actually need doing, and has no actual benefit at all, to anyone, isn’t a healthy activity.

I’m sure he learnt nothing whatsoever about anything in the process.

I don’t know why he decided to make a wifi kettle but if he made a challenge for himself and set out to learn the expertise and puzzled through the problem then I struggle to see that as a waste of time

But he didn’t go and invent or make the kettle – he just went and bought it.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/iKettle-2-0-Wi-Fi-Electric-Kettle/dp/B00BHXAWX4

And then discovered that it’s taken so long to get the bloody thing installed and working it’ll probably take him 10 years to work back the 11 hours of his life that it’s cost him.

Jaws is not about the shark.

Kettles are not about wi-fi

That wasn’t my interpretation due to

A key problem seemed to be that Rittman’s kettle didn’t come with software that would easily allow integration with other devices in his home, including Amazon Echo, which, like Apple’s Siri, allows users to tell connected smart devices what to do.

So Rittman was trying to build the integration functionality himself.

So I took it to mean it was building the integration that took ages.

True intelligence is realising you don’t need a WiFi kettle in the first place.

I expect he knows full well he doesn’t need it.

What you lot don’t realise is that when you pay for something in a shop with a debit card, loads of software systems interact with each other in ways very similar to this guy’s kettle and the rest of his house. It didn’t work perfectly first time, so teams of people had to work hard solving problems, adapting things, and diagnosing faults. Using these same sorts of skills.

I’ve never owned a wifi kettle, but I’ve spent countless days messing about with tech trying to get it to do what I want. And now, I’m working on banking systems for you lot. I work on them because I’m good at it, and I’m good because I’ve spent time on it. I wasn’t born good at making things work, I was born with the desire to make things work and solve problems.

And I ride bikes too.

Who remembers the Cambridge uni webcam to check whether the coffee pot was empty before walking down the hallway to get coffee?

What a waste of time that was, making video accessible live online.

Made me think of this: https://xkcd.com/1205/

If he boils that kettle 5 times per day and this has saved him 5 seconds per time, he’s an hour up.

So if we hack his kettle and boil it dry then we might be able to set his house on fire, awesome 😀

or somehow made the kettle incompatible with his network via some previous “tinkering” balls-up.

You do realise that outside of your comfortable little bubble not every network is the same? This is why people like Molgrips are paid money to get stuff like this working, it’s very similar and very transferable.

The post is not about the kettle – the kettle could be any number of voice activated internet connected widgets, doors, lights, a lift for a disable person etc etc.

It should be easy to connect internet widgets to each other. It isn’t, hence, #internetofshit instead of #internetofthings.

Jim gets it.

So if we hack his kettle and boil it dry then we might be able to set his house on fire, awesome

And oddly so do you. Even though you may not be aware of the fact and it’s another separate albeit not unrelated discussion.

This is why people like Molgrips are paid money to get stuff like this working,

Yes but spend the time and money on useful stuff, a wifi kettle is in no ways useful.

Also until we improve security on these devices I’d argue maybe it’s time we made things harder to connect to the internet not easier.

Yes but spend the time and money on useful stuff, a wifi kettle is in no ways useful.

Why can’t he spend his money on what pleases him? Like we do with bikes?

Also until we improve security on these devices I’d argue maybe it’s time we made things harder to connect to the internet not easier.

Point about security is that it’s meant to make it easy for you to connect to something but hard for everyone else. Not the same as just being hard for everyone 🙂

Digital paperweight anyone?

he’s ahead of the curve, gartner only just have IoT heading into the peak of inflated expectations, i think he’s firmly in the trough of disillusionment

Unfortunately, for every hero like Molgrips, preventing the entire fabric of western society from collapse, there is an apparently intelligent person designing a Bluetooth enabled toothbrush.

until we improve security on these devices I’d argue maybe it’s time we made things harder to connect to the internet not easier.

Given that the security is so lax maybe it is a good idea to play with trivial comparatively inexpensive things like kettles and not “spend the time and money on useful stuff” that could get hacked ?

If he boils that kettle 5 times per day and this has saved him 5 seconds per time, he’s an hour up.

Assuming his wifi doesn’t crash and he has to redo its settings……..

Yes but spend the time and money on useful stuff, a wifi kettle is in no ways useful.

You’re still getting hung up on the kettle. It’s not about the kettle. It’s about the application and integration of the technology and all the technicalities surrounding it.

It’s like people that make or restore things and never use them, why spend the time and effort in the first place? Because they enjoy it, because they learn something and ultimately it gives them a sense of fulfillment seeing the finished article working as they intended.

Molgrips are paid money to get stuff like this working

So you think it’s reasonable that you should buy a kettle then pay someone to spend 11 hours getting to work?
I plugged my wi-fi telly in and within 15 minutes it had found and connected to my NAS storage and internet-radio enabled stereo, which I would suggest is considerably more complex than sending a power on signal to a kettle.
However, Scottish Bloke Reads Manual And Gets Tech To Work is a less impressive headline than English Bloke Doesn’t.

I plugged my wi-fi telly in and within 15 minutes it had found and connected to my NAS storage and internet-radio enabled stereo…

And how do you think it managed those things? Magic?

Or was it perhaps programmed by folk like me or molgrips or kettle bloke, who have messed around with this stuff for you and got it to the stage where the software is intelligent enough to sort itself out?

You’re still getting hung up on the kettle. It’s not about the kettle

No, it’s exactly about the kettle. It’s a simple device that can be bought from a major retailer so should work. it didn’t work because it was either faulty or badly designed, or systems integrator genius is a bit less of a systems integrator genius than he likes to think. My car bluetooth – works. Internet telly – works. Both far more complex than switching on a kettle, and I learned nothing from setting either of them because they both worked.

Or was it perhaps programmed by folk like me or molgrips or kettle bloke,

you mean programmed so competently that it needs 11 hours of fettling to make it work?
Fortunately most consumer goods, like my car and internet telly, were designed and programmed by people who realise that most people (including people like me who do that sort of thing all day anyway) just want the things they buy to work they way they should.

BigButSlimmerBloke: you seem to have missed the key point that the guy was trying to get the kettle to do something that the manufacturers hadn’t intended it to do.

My car bluetooth – works. Internet telly – works.

Great – now does you car’s Bluetooth connect to your telly via IfThisThenThat or Amazon Echo?

Graham you’re wasting your breath, if people can’t understand after it’s been explained over and over there’s no hope.

It looks like he just wanted to be able to say
“Tea, Earl Grey, Hot” and get his drink in a Capt. Picard style.

I suppose 11 hours is short compared to building a starship.