“Over the long holiday weekend, the Financial Times reported that Apple may announce a plans for its smart home initiative at its Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) next month,” Chris Ciaccia writes for TheStreet. “The smart home initiative would use the iPhone as its base remote, with the smartphone controlling everything in your house — lights, appliances, security systems, and other connected devices, as technology companies turn their wares to the next ‘big thing.'”
“Cantor Fitzgerald analyst Brian White, who rates shares ‘buy’ with a $777 price target, notes that such a platform could be a precursor to the unveiling of the long-awaited iWatch,” Ciaccia writes. “‘During our China Tour last October, we indicated that we believed ‘iWatch’ could be used as a multi-purpose gateway for consumers to control their home,'” White wrote in a note.”
“In August 2013, Apple received a patent that would allow the iPhone to essentially work as a television and smart home remote, allowing users to manage and recall entertainment,” Ciaccia writes. “This isn’t the only patent Apple has received related to home automation…”
Read more in the full article here.
Related article:
Apple readying new software platform for the ‘Smart Home’ to be unveiled at WWDC sources say – May 26, 2014
I love it.
Some “news” source reports that Apple MAY do something.
Everyone else picks up on the report with wild speculation.
Everyone starts treating it as fact instead of rumor.
Everyone blames Apple for not following through on it when it turns out it was just a rumor.
Apple’s stock falls.
People move onto the next rumor.
It’s a vicious, never-ending cycle and it’s really laughable how stupid these people are. Then again, how stupid are we for taking the time to read and comment?
That’s because at least 40% of google’s entire workforce is now comprised of online analists. It now spends more money on financing favorable tech analist prognostications than R&D and engineering expenditure combined.
Correct. Announcing HomePlay and showing its use on the iPhone and iPad, hides the real target for this software, the forthcoming wearables.
It would make sense, with the car platform established surely a similar move in the home is due sometime in the near future and we all knew that an iWatch or some such device would have to have a function beyond present devices to make real sense so maybe there is real logic to these reports. Of course such logic could equally be made up or presumed by analysts and predicted as fact on that basis.
Hot news from the folks who brought you “Apple is buying Beats for $3.2B.”
And those who predicted an iPad mini, larger iPhones and The China deal. Oh hang on a minute.
One of the weaknesses of the iPhone and esp the iPad, is that these devices are not designed for sharing. I can just imagine how much worse it would be to have a non-sharable device that controls so many powered devices in one’s home. I can turn on or off a light near me at will right now, but when She-Who-Has-The-iDevice can do so remotely, life will be hell.
Ever thought that maybe “everyone” in the house might be able to control the lights? Just like they can now with the switch. Or maybe take it a step further and allow parental controls on certain things.
That’s just how the apps are designed. No reason each iPhone couldn’t have the HomePlay app installed and could control various settings, perhaps with a master account that the parents control and kids can’t override (e.g. thermostat, TV auto-shut off, etc.).
You two took the words out of my mouth I don’t know any home that has a lock on the light switch with only one key.
You guys miss the point. I want to turn on and off lights near me, not in other rooms I am not in, though someone else might be. But apparently it will be possible for someone equipped with the appropriate iDevice who is is in one of the other ten or so rooms, or possibly not even in the house, to control the lights I will be trying to read, or navigate, by.
I have stayed in hotels where you can control all the devices in your room from one remote, lights, tv, heating, window shades, etc, and that’s handy. But a house has a great many more rooms and many, many more devices. Why on earth would you want to control lights in a remote room of the house? That metaphorical lock on the light switch is simply one’s presence in the room and not in some other room or outside in the yard. The metaphorical lock on appliances such as the stove is even more important.
I ain’t wearing nary watch. iPhone in me pocket, fine. Watch on me wrist, nope. Haven’t worn a watch in many years.
+1 and a thousand or so students.
People should go to a mall or college and see if people still are wearing wrist watches. A majority don’t and those that do wear them as status symbols, not as a functioning time piece. If you ask someone for the time, they will grab their phone because most likely it a lot more accurate.
Like you, I won’t be wearing a large bulky Dick Tracy knock-off but if it was something as small as a Nike band and it wasn’t something I was meant to look at but basically interact with, I could be persuaded to wear something like that.
As I’ve said many times, I need Siri to move with me in my daily activities and be able to communicate and hear me. Then the “connected home” would be very much obtainable.
I had a room mate in the early 80s who controlled the house thermostats, the TV and the radio, remotely, with his Apple ][.
I was very impressed until I saw my first Mac in ’84.
I imagine they are building several giant, monolithic iPhones with antigravity plates, will fly them over google’s and samsung’s various facilities and turn off the anti-grav and that will crush them.
Maybe I should read the article. Maybe I just don’t care. I get so sick of the idiotic articles about who is going to crush whom. It’s all sheer nonsense, and irrelevant tripe designed to get people to click and be inundated with ads. I block every ad there is on the web, including above all else, those freaking YouTube ads, and hope everyone else does the same… Maybe if we remove the incentive, they will only write when they have something actually worth saying.
Funny, and I share the sentiment. They are not going away anytime soon though. For every person that blocks ads or avoids ad-centric sites altogether, there are 500 clods.