From smart speakers and fitness trackers to Wi-Fi fridges and interconnected air fryers, smart products have integrated seamlessly into people’s homes and everyday lives – in fact, research shows that four in five Brits own at least one.*
People: Oh how cool, I can monitor my chicken nuggets from my couch ~5m away.
This would genuinely be handy for me though. I’ve got a nine year old, and have similar aged kids over quite regularly. If I’m dealing with the kids, I can’t always hear the air fryer finishing. A notification to the phone that’s in my pocket would be really helpful.
As you say though, there’s always shit tacked on :(
There are numerous benefits in IoT / smart home and ubiquitous computing. Used in the right ways it can make your life so much better and even save lives. It is just sad to see all the wasted potential, the greediness and straight up noncompliance with basic human rights and needs for simplicity and privacy in its design.
Funny enough, it got me into reading some threads of people reverse engineering air fryer APIs (didn’t expect that to ever happen) and it reminded me again of how great and compassionate some people are. Makes the stupid cat and mouse game seem even more stupid when 3 guys in their spare time can rebuild a 5 layer deep authentication stack with some unknown Philips / Xiaomi server that probably needed tens or even hundreds of engineers to build in an obfuscated manner in the first place.
It’d be nice to be able to do that while my hands are dirty doing something else, instead of stopping and cleaning them so I don’t put salmonella on the oven knobs.
As someone with ADHD, the implemented order of operations is never logically optimal.
The more steps I have to do to course correct the more likely I fuck up the next thing.
Home automation is a godsend for me.
I don’t have an air fryer but if I did, the biggest help for me would be some sort of obnoxiously obvious reminder the nuggs are done so I don’t A) burn the house down, or B) have cold nuggs when I wake up from my hyperfocus an hour later.
My husband has been wondering if he should get formally diagnosed for ADHD now that our kid has been. (Talk about a carbon copy of a parent, this kid, geeze.) This explains a lot about the way he cooks. He always says it’s because he “needs more practice” but all I see is a chaotic stressful experience, and of course if I try to help him I just get in the way and make him irritated that I seem to think he can’t manage it on his own. Anyway all I’m saying is that it’s interesting to read your comment because I wonder if that’s my husband’s trouble, too.
Certainly sounds familiar, my tip to him is to try and write recipes down and get in the habit of mise en place-ing (prep chopping / pre-measuring) when you know what you’re gonna cook. Once the food hits the hot pan, any semblance of a plan goes out the window
(but also know “sticking to habits” is hard for us with ADHD, as it frequently goes against our nature, so don’t be shocked if he struggles there)
I tend to be the one to cook the “whatever’s leftover in the fridge” dish, which is a guaranteed source of a little chaos. In those instances it’s always helpful to have my wife around to pass ingredients or do some prep tasks on the side so I don’t lose focus and burn the onions.
Also, if you don’t already have recipes written down, having someone help build out a recipe book as you go can help smooth out future cooks.
Shout out to Recipe Keeper - after a first cook, usually from a website or book, we put everything we like in there for future reference.
Sometimes I forget. It would also be useful if I’m not in the kitchen and want to start it without having to go there and back to what I was doing while waiting for it to heat, if it’s something like a frozen pizza that doesn’t take much prep time.
FFS an air fryer is a heating element, fan, and thermostat.
Why are any of them being built with online connectivity and data harvesting capabilities in the first place?!
Manufacturers: To deliver solutions to nonexistent problems. Free money.
Politics: To save our economy. It can only survive if people buy new stuff all the time. Could also come in handy as surveillance measure one day.
People: Oh how cool, I can monitor my chicken nuggets from my couch ~5m away.
This would genuinely be handy for me though. I’ve got a nine year old, and have similar aged kids over quite regularly. If I’m dealing with the kids, I can’t always hear the air fryer finishing. A notification to the phone that’s in my pocket would be really helpful.
As you say though, there’s always shit tacked on :(
There are numerous benefits in IoT / smart home and ubiquitous computing. Used in the right ways it can make your life so much better and even save lives. It is just sad to see all the wasted potential, the greediness and straight up noncompliance with basic human rights and needs for simplicity and privacy in its design.
Funny enough, it got me into reading some threads of people reverse engineering air fryer APIs (didn’t expect that to ever happen) and it reminded me again of how great and compassionate some people are. Makes the stupid cat and mouse game seem even more stupid when 3 guys in their spare time can rebuild a 5 layer deep authentication stack with some unknown Philips / Xiaomi server that probably needed tens or even hundreds of engineers to build in an obfuscated manner in the first place.
I set a timer on your phone to match(ish) the timer on the air fryer
“hey Google, preheat the oven to 350°”
It’d be nice to be able to do that while my hands are dirty doing something else, instead of stopping and cleaning them so I don’t put salmonella on the oven knobs.
You could just do that first
As someone with ADHD, the implemented order of operations is never logically optimal.
The more steps I have to do to course correct the more likely I fuck up the next thing.
Home automation is a godsend for me.
I don’t have an air fryer but if I did, the biggest help for me would be some sort of obnoxiously obvious reminder the nuggs are done so I don’t A) burn the house down, or B) have cold nuggs when I wake up from my hyperfocus an hour later.
My husband has been wondering if he should get formally diagnosed for ADHD now that our kid has been. (Talk about a carbon copy of a parent, this kid, geeze.) This explains a lot about the way he cooks. He always says it’s because he “needs more practice” but all I see is a chaotic stressful experience, and of course if I try to help him I just get in the way and make him irritated that I seem to think he can’t manage it on his own. Anyway all I’m saying is that it’s interesting to read your comment because I wonder if that’s my husband’s trouble, too.
Certainly sounds familiar, my tip to him is to try and write recipes down and get in the habit of mise en place-ing (prep chopping / pre-measuring) when you know what you’re gonna cook. Once the food hits the hot pan, any semblance of a plan goes out the window
(but also know “sticking to habits” is hard for us with ADHD, as it frequently goes against our nature, so don’t be shocked if he struggles there)
I tend to be the one to cook the “whatever’s leftover in the fridge” dish, which is a guaranteed source of a little chaos. In those instances it’s always helpful to have my wife around to pass ingredients or do some prep tasks on the side so I don’t lose focus and burn the onions.
Also, if you don’t already have recipes written down, having someone help build out a recipe book as you go can help smooth out future cooks.
Shout out to Recipe Keeper - after a first cook, usually from a website or book, we put everything we like in there for future reference.
Sometimes I forget. It would also be useful if I’m not in the kitchen and want to start it without having to go there and back to what I was doing while waiting for it to heat, if it’s something like a frozen pizza that doesn’t take much prep time.