Sprinklers
IN the hall during the break I met a guy from IBM who works in Austin - he does energy. Sits on the city council, etc, and works on conservation. IBM has a smart house in Austin, which I saw a few years ago (2003) and wrote up for a net.wars (”And there will come soft sprinklers” if you want to find it). The system gives your house an interface you control from a TV, but the thing that blew me away was there was a page for your sprinkler system, and a little box to tick that says, “Observe municipal watering regulations”. You tick this box and thereafter your automated sprinkler system can download constraints from the municipal authority, so you *automatically* do not water your lawn at the wrong times during a drought, etc. I thought this was *brilliant* and the most useful thing I’d ever seen it proposed for a Smart House to do. This capability is now being rolled out to the entire city of Austin.
*This* is a tiny piece of what egovernment should be. Making it effortless to follow rules that are in the public good - though note you do not have to tick the box.
wg
March 30th, 2007 at 6:54 pm
I love the idea of an “Obey ze orders” checkbox. Very important for countries with Germanic administration, such as your glorious US&A or Switzerland. Not much call for a system like that in Italy or South America…
April 3rd, 2007 at 2:53 am
Well, since you don’t have to tick the box, I don’t think I agree with that. It simply offers you the option of obeying the rules without having to know what they are. As energy and water conservation continue to be important issues, this kind of thing will probably be seen as helpfully public-spirited.
wg