Sorry, Son, You Are Wasting Your Time

He was so polite, clean cut, well dressed, well trained. And his company had a good sales strategy: install packages of Internet-of-things in homes as a sort of demonstration project to launch the business in the area. It was the whole package: he had the app, the video wi-fi connected door bell, the home alarm system, the wi fi connected thermostat But I stopped him in the middle of his spiel.  It’s a no go for us. I didn’t ask him about his company’s tech support, but I should have.

Why?

Things break. New technology has bugs. Even relatively established technology such as internet service and wi-fi home routers frustrates us. It has taken dozens of visits to work out the bugs in a new state-of-the-art high efficiency furnace. It would randomly quit in the middle of the night. We’re best friends with Paul the HVAC guy. We have a new wireless printer that won’t connect to our wi-fi, and it is spotty upstairs. And you want to give us *more* tech.

Of course “Technology is neutral. It does what we ask it do. It becomes problematic when it’s an extension of our dysfunction.”  The problem is also when we just adopt it just because it’s available, or when we adopt it without a thought for what we expect it to do. So, you get all these IOT devices installed, and now your house is online. Now it can be hacked.

Similar Posts