The Internet of Things

In the summer of 1984 I was at a friend’s house whose wife worked at a large cosmetics company in the department that we now refer to as IT but was then known as data processing.

In any event she was typing furiously on her new IBM PC and paused occasionally to laugh out loud. Curious I asked her what was so funny and she replied, “My friend is sending me dirty jokes.”

On that sweltering July day I was first introduced to the process called electronic mail, albeit in an X-rated version.

Fast forward 30 years or so. 

Today Internet connectivity has become an inarguable staple both socially and career wise, I often wondered what the next phase would bring.

Well, apparently I’m one of the last to know about the “Internet of Things,” where tech giants such as Apple, Google and Samsung are rolling out app-controlled devices designed to bridge the gap between the physical and digital worlds. While social media and data collection have connected us all in ways most could never have imagined (and certainly not me back in 1984), the next phase will bring a heightened level of connectedness —between humans and machines.

For example, in your home, sensors in your refrigerator would detect if you were running low on eggs or butter and immediately re-order for delivery, while a recent test from Samsung had a washing machine send an alert that its filter was failing and needed a new one.

Tech consulting company Gartner estimates connected household devices will spike in number from fewer than 300 million this year to more than 1 billion by 2017.

As the Internet of Things evolves, experts predict that devices for smartphones will be able to emit an odor of a restaurant entrée from its online menu, or giving online shoppers a feel of fabrics from a couch or carpet simply by touching a screen. For those of you who ae fitness buffs and possess those fitness trackers, in 10 years those sensors will be implanted in our bodies, say futurists.

According to Cisco Systems, more than 1.5 trillion “things” exist in the physical world and 99 percent of those will eventually become part of a digital network.

Sounds a bit Orwellian to be sure.

But will it play in accounting? I don’t know if I would be comfortable with a smart device programmed to say, perform an audit or prepare a tax return, because as those in the profession know, there’s a bit of judgment that goes with both and at this stage I don’t know how many preparers would defer a decision to a device.

But I’ll let far brighter minds than mine sort that out.

I would simply be content with a device that reminds me of when we’re low on toilet paper and laundry detergent. I’m tired of making those late night runs to the store.