Inside Andy Rubin's Quest to Create an OS for Everything

https://www.wired.com/story/inside-andy-rubins-quest-to-create-an-os-for-everything/

by cpeterso • 9 years ago

103 92 9 years ago

jpm_sd2• 9 years ago

Who is all this engineering effort for?

How many people live in fortresses of solitude where they need to automatically track the cars that come down the driveway?

How many Silicon Valley billionaires need a computer to tell them what to wear today? (t-shirt and jeans again?)

Why is it useful to have automated control of the lights in every room? Turning lights on and off, using a plain old mechanical switch, is about the easiest, most mindless task I perform on any given day.

riku_iki2• 9 years ago

Looks like good tech for very automated jail.

digi_owl• 9 years ago

Brave New World for corporations, 1984 for governments?

yters2• 9 years ago

Or mass housing.

stephengillie2• 9 years ago

A jail with bars made out of numbers is still a jail.

Jyaif• 9 years ago

Light is not just on/off, it's a million different shades and intensities, some more appropriate depending on the time of day.

Who is all this engineering effort for Everybody.

Sure right now philips hue cost hundreds of dollars, but that price is going to drop seriously. The price of smart-everything is going to drop.

Try to imagine a house where there's a thousand different machines just there to make your life nicer.

leeoniya2• 9 years ago

Light is not just on/off, it's a million different shades and intensities, some more appropriate depending on the time of day.

remarkable! how did people ever live without this before?

but i'd still be stuck having to chew my own food? oh wait, soylent!

throwaway7645• 9 years ago

A thousand different unnecessary components to break and require fixing. Some people will like this, but I think it's going to cause more headache than it helps.

jerrylives2• 9 years ago

Light is not just on/off, it's a million different shades and intensities, some more appropriate depending on the time of day.

Yea so you install one of these http://www.homedepot.com/b/Electrical-Dimmers-Switches-Outle...

Try to imagine a house where there's a thousand different machines just there to make your life nicer.

Now try to imagine all the gaping security holes emanating from your house. And oh man it's gonna suck when the remote server goes down and your thermostat can't phone home so you're stuck at 55F during the winter

LeoPanthera• 9 years ago

What exactly is your point?

That he shouldn't be inventing all this stuff? Why not?

As the article says, he's ahead of the curve. The next generation will consider all this stuff normal, and just the way the world works.

But if we didn't have people making stuff just because they wanted it, nothing would ever happen.

jpm_sd2• 9 years ago

My point is that people probably don't want this stuff.

chaostheory• 9 years ago

No one needs it, just as no one needs online video streaming

To better understand, the movie Her is good for context: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Her_(film) - everything is seemless and automatic, like having an omniscient butler

As others have mentioned, China and Singapore are also other motivations ie. 'automated jails', especially since western governments are moving closer to their philsophy of control while they simultaneously criticize it.

vasilipupkin• 9 years ago

I assure you, turning lights on and off by hand in a large house full of kids is a royal pain in the ass. If you live in a half a room size appt in SF, not so much

8ytecoder• 9 years ago

Why is a connected light better than a simple motion activated one?

hinkley5• 9 years ago

In my old house, not a single light switch is where you'd expect it to be, and a number of the rooms are byways between other rooms.

So being able to turn the light on when you walked in was no guarantee you'd be able to do the same when you walked out again.

hinkley5• 9 years ago

So your parents never yelled at you about leaving the lights on when you were a kid?

And you never yell at anyone you know about doing the same?

georgemcbay• 9 years ago

I'm not at all against people automating the hell out of their homes, so I'm on "your side" as it were, but this isn't the greatest argument in favor.

People yelling at family members over leaving the lights are essentially "penny pinching" fractional cents of energy costs. I'm sure all the computers, sensors, networking gear, etc, that make this all work consume significantly more power than if you were just to leave every light in your house on 100% of the time, especially if we're talking about LED bulbs.

bsder• 9 years ago

Turning lights on and off, using a plain old mechanical switch, is about the easiest, most mindless task I perform on any given day.

Agreed, but ...

The switch and light are where the original house owner wanted them. If I want to move either of them, I'm calling an electrician and tearing through walls. And, if you want to add a second switch that controls one light, good luck.

Being able to wire the light and the switch separately is useful.

smacktoward• 9 years ago

Here's some free advice: Don’t try to break into Andy Rubin’s house. As soon as your car turns into the driveway at his sprawling pad in the Silicon Valley hills, a camera will snap a photo of your vehicle, run it through computer-vision software to extract the plate number, and file it into a database. Rubin’s system can be set to text him every time a certain car shows up or to let specific vehicles through the gate.

This just makes me wonder how far you could get if you took a piece of cardboard the size of a license plate and wrote the plate number of Rubin's car on it in magic marker...

jerrylives2• 9 years ago

https://hackaday.com/2014/04/04/sql-injection-fools-speed-tr...

2_listerine_pls• 9 years ago

This is fantastic

jeff_petersen• 9 years ago

Wasn't this actually an X-files episode? I remember a rich techie developing a home AI that Scully and Mulder eventually fooled by stealing a license plate it recognized and putting it on a different car.

malandrew• 9 years ago

Such a system should prompt two-factor auth. Once the license plate is recognized, an auth request is pushed to Andy's phone and then he verifies by voice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zVgWpVXb64

balls187• 9 years ago

Here's some free advice: Don’t try to break into Andy Rubin’s house.

Seems like that is just asking to have people break into his house.

backtoyoujim2• 9 years ago

I wonder if he is using wireless cameras because I have an uneducated theory that I would like a smart person here to destroy. So please forgive my lack of knowledge here.

If I made a device that amplified the RF signal from a wifi router ... made it like it had the rf signal power output would that device be capable of "drowning out" other wifi transmitters ... making a wifi camera incapable of seeing its base station ?

ac29• 9 years ago

RF signal jammers are a thing.... they also are illegal. Certainly if you had a RF source blanket the WiFi spectrum at 1kW, you'd knock out WiFi cameras (legal operation in the WiFi spectrum is limited to 1W, and is often used at less). The same idea would apply to anything using a radio, like cell phones, GPS, etc.

Again, this is completely illegal though.

cairo_x• 9 years ago

How does this even warrant an article?

debt• 9 years ago

I think we need a programming language for everything not an operating system. Certain language primitives should be connected devices themselves.

Only because a language is more efficient then just another set of SDKs and libraries being cobbled together to access the nearest HomePod for instance.

I assume Apple's HealthKit is in line with the operating system of IoT, as I would assume most connected things would be read-only, and we'd only be reading things like battery life, air quality, lock status, speed, etc from devices. I wouldn't want to be able to for instance turn on the turn signal for my car by accident running some script I wrote.

throwaway478614• 9 years ago

I am surprised nobody mentioned this guy's failure to deliver the Essential Phone in time (whether it's essential is a huge argument point by itself).

Cynically speaking, to me that's a paid article to keep hype around the persona since he's losing a lot of PR points lately.

I am not taking such a "visionary" seriously unless he manages to ship the one consumer-level product he promised.

And yes, many of his ideas are COMMON SENSE, I can't for the life of me understand the praise.

flamedoge• 9 years ago

I feel like a lot of those common sense ideas could still use streamlining to put in homes. Why can't I live like Rubin? Why should these devices be only for the rich? Hook up a hydrometer and switch and sell it to me as relative humidity aware fan controller.

throwaway478614• 9 years ago

I think the hyped euphemisms are carefully crafted to make the people feel important if they buy something. It's a very regular psychological technique in marketing.

civilitty• 9 years ago

Nitpick: Hydrometers measure the specific gravity of liquids and are mostly used for beverages such as to calculate a liquid's sugar or alcohol contents.

You're thinking of hygrometers, which measure relative humidity using capacitive, resistive, or gravimetric methods.

DAddYE• 9 years ago

Can’t agree more. Also the “invention” of android is debatable to me. Wasn’t a rushed response to iOS?

dingo_bat2• 9 years ago

AFAIK Android was already under development but arrival of iPhone caused it to be completely modified before release.

j452• 9 years ago

Not sure a 1st generation device or creator can be judged like that.

New devices and manufacturers don't typically improve the 3rd or 4th generation.

Rushed devices are largely premature, unusuable, and still move things forward: iPhone 1, Galaxy Note 1..

When did quality, functionality, delivering on scale and time get better? iPhone 3-4, Galaxy Note 3-4, LG G3-G4, Samsung S3-S4, iPad 3-4, Nexus 4-5.

Hype aside, the first effort isn't something that should be undercut.

throwaway478614• 9 years ago

I don't disagree.

What I am saying is that writing such articles is embarrassing and reads like a paid hype. Plus the guy really doesn't have much under his belt.

I and many other practical people dislike person cults. Especially such forced ones.

Steko• 9 years ago

this guy's failure to deliver the Essential Phone in time

Hasn't been a good month for Essential. The phone he promised in June didn't ship in July, lost VP's of marketing and communication and today Google hired away his lead UX designer to fill the same role for Google Home.

throwaway478614• 9 years ago

Exactly what I was also aiming at; such mass exodus events signal either (a) that Rubin hired a bunch of greedy freeloaders that leave after the first signs of struggle, or (b) he is a dictator who's not pleasant to work with.

Both of these aren't promising.

6stringmerc• 9 years ago

Moeller Air Car rings a bell...wonder if any of the SV pursuits got the memo...

arnaudsm• 9 years ago

Ambient OS looks like the Microsoft Windows of smart-homes. We need an open protocol for smart-homes, like TCP/IP for the Web. Something you have control on, that encourages competition and that can't be bricked by the company.

Never forget : http://uk.businessinsider.com/googles-nest-closing-smart-hom...

briandear• 9 years ago

This is all well and good, but installing all of this stuff is the substantial blocker for me. I live in a big old house made out of stone with walls that are impenetrable without a very serious drill.

Unless someone solves the installation question, I’m going to have to sit this one out. Even running Ethernet wire to just the next room is a massive undertaking.

Completely wireless home automation that is simple to install – that would be a game changer for me. I shouldn’t have to practically hire an architect to plan the install for some of this stuff.

Duhck2• 9 years ago

This is a serious hype piece. The problem is stated clearly: the smart home industry is expensive, fragmented, and complicated. This isn't news to anyone at all but there seems to be a lack of a viable solution.

Simply connecting every gadget to some variety of interfaces has already been done dozens of times over (e.g. Crestron, control4, smartthings)

I'm in the camp that one company should make all the devices versus an open standard. That's the only way to guarantee quality.

Candidly, I don't think everything in the modern home will look like Andy's home. Instead our homes will have a few key devices like lights, speakers, locks and HVAC that make sense to interconnect.

Once we agree that not every fridge or microwave needs an internet connection, you'll see how ridiculous his vision statement becomes.

My 700sqft apartment doesn't benefit from any of this "innovation" and doesnt suffer from the mess of gadgets that don't talk to each other.

This is a wealthy persons problem and a tinkerers desires.

CapitalistCartr• 9 years ago

In a decade every electrical appliance will have a chip linking it to a central controller much as cars work now. Sensors allow the automotive computer to minutely control every detail of the car's functions. In the same way, house functions will become more efficient and automated.

I am not at all a fan of this future, but it is coming on fast. Those of us opposed will be like people now stubbornly driving older, less complex autos.

Duhck2• 9 years ago

I hear you... commoditization of connected hardware makes this future a real possibility, and yet it hasn't gained consumer traction and it does add real cost to the products. $3-5 of hardware cost + thousands of hours of software adds $30+ of cost to the consumer on most devices. Thats a lot

When that changes I'm still not sure it'll happen. There needs to be a consumer demand and today there isn't.

robolange• 9 years ago

Yup. My 1987 Toyota pickup contains no digital computer whatsoever. It's so mechanically simple. I'm pretty sure I could do or have done any major repair (e.g., full transmission replacement, major engine overhaul) for less money than the cost to replace a just-out-of-warranty computer module in a newer vehicle. I realize that computers enable better fuel efficiency, but I just don't see how all that added complexity is worth it in a gasoline-powered vehicle. I'll willingly part with it only when all-electric becomes economically viable.

stephengillie2• 9 years ago

City buses already need to be pulled over and rebooted periodically.

nine_k• 9 years ago

The reason computers are increasingly used in cars is that they make the car cheaper. High-precision, high-durability mechanical parts are expensive.

Go shop for a decent motorcycle chain, compare it to the cost of a Raspberry Pi. Removing a complex mechanical part and replacing it with a simpler computer-controller part is a no-brainer.

hinkley5• 9 years ago

Successful product first, open standards second, rich ecosystem third.

paulmd• 9 years ago

Fully agree that not everything needs internet access, but you listed some useful ones.

I don't think this is actually a hardware company at all, to be honest. The actual hardware here is practically trivial, like an ESP8266 that bitbangs the legacy interface. Hopefully some tinkerer would design some PCBs once and just release them as CC, problem solved forever.

It's fairly straightforward to send a request to the adapter node and have it do a thing. Again, a hobbyist could probably come up with a reasonably coherent protocol in like an hour or two. There is some small value in a company that can make the act of pairing less painful for consumers, but tinkerers probably won't care.

The actual hard part is coming up with software that does useful things with those peripherals/API. He's selling an app, basically.

petra• 9 years ago

This is a common problem in Silicon Valley: building platforms, instead of focusing on solving valuable problems.

But instead let's focus on an important problem many humans have(to a lesser or greater degree) - bad memory. And it's very valuable - employers would be happy for better employees that do less errors, and people would really appreciate better memory. So there's money in this.

But if you think about it - the smartwatch could be a great memory aid[1].

And i've seen some research showing smart watch based checklists could help nurses reduce error rates. And another research app that could help people with Alzheimer.

But nothing on the market. And zero effort from the big guys to work on that specific problem. And thus we get the smartwatch - a useless gadget that solves tiny insignificant problems. And thus it failed.

And it's the same thing with the IOT. Solve the elderly fall detection problem, well. Solve the security problem, well. Find a few more key problems like this and solve them. This will make your solution a must have. Than you could build a good platform and convince others to join(assuming you're not too greedy).

And as for the quality problem you mentioned? There are ways to create platforms that guarantee quality. For example, a rust based microcontorller OS, that severly limits what apps can do.

[1]Think of having voice activated checklists[1](to reduce errors at your job or home) that are always there. Or after having an important conversation , saying "remember", and the watch remembers. And of course voice activated search. And context dependent search(using something like a high-accuracy location detection) to better narrow search and effectively present contextual info. Or use knowledge from psychology about how our memory works,

lanius• 9 years ago

If by some miracle you were to make it all the way to the front door, you’d never get past the retinal scanner.

I thought iris scanners were superior?

miguelrochefort• 9 years ago

The secrecy of this project will ensure its failure.

The fragmentation of data and UI affects a lot more people than the fragmentation of smart home products. The solution to both is not a proprietary interface built on top of an aggregator, but a completely new language and communication paradigm.

I'm sure he thinks he's ambitious, but this article failed to demonstrate he's doing anything novel.

zakki• 9 years ago

Hasn't Linux become OS for everything?

bryananderson• 9 years ago

It's funny that the article mentions a past Rubin startup that got the timing wrong on the early side - this one seems to be on the late side. Most people have realized by now that most of these smart home gadgets are solutions in search of a problem. They're fun for people like Rubin and myself who like to tinker, hack, and customize, but they don't deliver a compelling value proposition for consumers. Most people simply do not need Internet-connected doorknobs or a ton of cameras all around their property. Household chores take up a lot of time that people would rather spend otherwise, but the IoT smart home industry has addressed virtually none of that. It's the laundry that takes up too much of my time, not getting up to turn on the light switch.

mycall• 9 years ago

or to let specific vehicles through the gate

Put a fake license plate on a drone, watch his gates open, then fly away.

ShabbosGoy• 9 years ago

This read like a puff piece to me.

Andy Rubin will be judged on execution, not by the quantity of positive news article that are written about him.

baybal2• 9 years ago

Andy Rubin is an engineer, not a hip-startup visionaire director by his nature. "Visionaire directors," are not smart people in their prevalent majority, and Rubin is just to high on intellectual ladder to be one.

And his phone... he believed that hole in the screen is a "smart idea"... That was super disappointing

mmjaa• 9 years ago

I'm turning my house, built in the 70's, into a smart-home: I'm going solar, its got an amazing garden, we have access to deep water reserves, and we're going off the grid.

The hoops to jump through for all of this really are quite insurmountable in some aspects. There really is a need for it - and where I think this is going to be of great benefit to the broader public, is when we get smart-houses going through the same Moores-law iterations that computers went through.

Hell yeah I wanna know how much energy I harvested from the sun and wind and rain this month. No, I don't want it available on the cloud, to anyone else. Yes, I do want a system I can maintain and control myself - definitely I don't want to have a system in my house which is closed off in order to protect the self-interests of other entities.

Its a huge new realm for computing, this off-grid stuff. I really hope the grid'ists don't fuck it up.

Inside Andy Rubin's Quest to Create an OS for Everything

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