Hmmm, will the next generation of internet connectivity be a dystopian nightmare or a revealing light of hope?
The year is 2050. You are living in Cyberville. Information and communication technologies have been harnessed to wirelessly link urban services. Traffic management, energy use, health care, water use and waste management are all integrated on the smart grid to reduce costs and predict resource consumption. All this happens seamlessly in cyberspace.
It is known as a smart city and it is closer to fact than science fiction thanks to IoT. IoT stands for the Internet of Things – a network of physical objects (i.e. things) embedded with electronics, software, sensors and network connectivity. Experts predict there will be 50 billion objects in the IoT by the year 2020.
In simple terms, the Internet of Things enables objects to be controlled remotely across existing network infrastructures. The result is direct integration between the physical world and computer-based systems.
An aside: British entrepreneur Kevin Ashton is credited with coining the term back in 1999. I for one am sorely disappointed by his lack of creativity. Had a writer have been brought into the equation, he or she could have crafted a far more engaging name!
So what, you ask, are the potential applications for this new age technology? The possibilities are startling:
- Heart monitoring implants
- Biochip transponders on farm animals
- Automobiles with built-in sensors
- DNA analysis devices for environmental or food pathogen monitoring
- Field operation devices that assist firefighters in search and rescue operations
- Intelligent shopping systems that monitor users’ purchasing habits
- Collecting information from natural ecosystems
- Electric clams in coastal waters
Electric clams? I kid you not. Scientists have apparently figured out how to make a clam into an electricity generator. It has something to do with an enzyme that coats a carbon-based electrode which is then placed between the clam’s body wall and heart. How this factors into the Internet of Things is much too complicated for my middle-aged brain to comprehend.
There is a camp of critics who perceive the Internet of Things as a dystopian nightmare in which everyone and everything will be monitored on the internet. Orwell’s metaphorical Big Brother crossing over from fiction to reality. I will resist the temptation to jump on that bandwagon.
Instead, I am opting for kaleidoscope as a hopeful metaphor for the Internet of Things – the light of technology shining through the optic of human imagination revealing a continually shifting array of possibilities. In the final analysis, It is all about choosing the right possibilities and consciously discarding – if necessary, outlawing – the wrong ones.
~ Michael Robert Dyet is the author of “Until the Deep Water Stills – An Internet-enhanced Novel” – double winner in the Reader Views Literary Awards 2009. Visit Michael’s website at www.mdyetmetaphor.com or the novel online companion at www.mdyetmetaphor.com/blog.
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Tags: Bib Brother · electric clams · internet connectivity · Internet of Things · IoT · kaleidoscope · metaphor · Michael Robert Dyet · smart citiesNo Comments