This is the third in a series of posts around the Gemalto M2M Fact or Fiction quiz, which pits you against a series of scenarios – real or imagined – to test how much of an M2M visionary you are. For the whole quiz, click here, and for other posts in the series – click here.
If you got this one wrong, shame on you. M2M Fridges have been a mainstay of the discussion around the Internet of Things before most of us had broadband connections or WiFi. According to Wikipedia, LG’s first connected Fridge – priced at a measly $20,000 – went on the market in 2000. Whilst it didn’t succeed, the idea of connected fridges, and new applications for connected fridges, have evolved a great deal over the years.
Starbucks, for example, is reportedly looking into connecting it’s fridges to notify employees of when milk has passed its best before date, and our friends at Telefonica have summed up some of the latest developments from Samsung and LG have made – in terms of turning the connected fridge into one part of a broader connected home ecosystem – into a reality.
Whilst the connected fridge definitely ticks the box of ‘fact’ for many the reality hasn’t quite lived up to the hype. The problem it’s attempting to solve is a little too complicated to be convenient as yet. Perhaps in time, when instead of barcodes products are embedded with RFID chips that contains critical information about them (expiry dates etc), it’ll become a more helpful tool.
In the meantime, we can always make a wishlist of features for our own connected fridges.
Did you get this question right in our quiz? Take it here.
