The global brain

A revolution is underway, one that is on track to radically change the way citizens of affluent countries live, and it involves becoming “smart” — in a radiofrequency (RF) energy-emitting sense. The nexus between the internet and the smartphone is fertile ground for a growing number of smart home devices, and over the next couple of years these are expected to undergo an explosion in quantity. Predictions of the number of connected things in use worldwide by 2020 range from 20–50 billion.

An internet of things

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a vision of appliances and objects communicating with one another in a structure that increasingly resembles a global brain. Another frequently used term for it is the “smart grid”.

For users, there’s a range of anticipated benefits. These include convenience, information feedback, the ability to control at a distance, increased productivity and energy efficiency. The location of an item can be pinpointed, enabling IoT to be used in industrial automation and inventory management. Amazon, an early adopter of IoT technology, in early 2018 took out a patent on an IoT wristband to be worn by employees, one that would detect motion to monitor performance.

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