Deb Shinder at WXPNews has inspired me to add another post to the home automation discussion. My last post regarding home messaging technologies that I think should exist generated some good discussion, so lets expand the discussion to the real brain center of the human dwelling… the kitchen.
In Deb’s latest newsletter she talks about all the refrigerators that used to be in showrooms that talked about being connected to the Internet and networked with everything else in your house. They had LCD’s or even small computers embedded in the door even.
Where did all of them go? They were cool. The idea was nice. The price tag was a big pill to swallow and the average consumer just didn’t grab a hold of the idea. But does that make it a bad idea?
As I think about opportunities for home automation in the kitchen, I think less about the devices themselves and more about the functions and helpful features that could be seen.
Imagine combining bar code scanning with perhaps RFID technology so your refrigerator and pantry could build your shopping list for you and automatically send you a list to pick up some things on your way home. Imagine mashing that together with a coupon service that points you to both where and when to buy certain products to get the most value.
Or, what if your pantry and fridge could chat it up with each other and start coming up with tonight’s dinner menu using what you already have available?