Can Amazon’s new Dash really connect IoT dots?

Amazon debuted its Dash buttons last year, letting you re-order a specific item when you’re running low with the touch of a button, and today it has expanded the capabilities for Internet of Things (IoT) developers with the new AWS IoT button.

The button works on the Amazon Web Services framework and allows developers to change an entire IoT system with one press. Developers (or anyone with basic experience on AWS) will be able to implement the Dash button to do all sorts of things.

See Also: Cisco report finds hidden costs of delivering IIoT services

“The button can be used as a remote control for Netflix, a switch for your Philips Hue light bulb, a check-in/check-out device for Airbnb guests, or a way to order your favorite pizza for delivery,” said Amazon in the announcement.

It appears to be mostly for hackers and tinkerers that want to explore the capabilities of the Dash button, though we wouldn’t rule out companies like Philips or Nest adding official support for smart home devices.

We’ve already seen Netflix launch its own step-by-step guide for “The Switch”, a button that turns on Netflix and changes the settings on a bunch of other smart home devices, like dimming Hue lights, ordering food, and turning smartphones on ‘do not disturb’ mode.

Dash doesn’t just do detergent

For anyone interested, the AWS IoT button costs just under $20, but stock sold out in under 24 hours. Amazon has not said when it will be back in stock.

Amazon’s original Dash was an impulse purchase-enabling tool like no other. After a year on the market, and coming in dozens of popular brands that will let you scratch your itch for detergent or toilet paper, it’s interesting to have a button that doesn’t make us lie the only thing w’re eager to do is buy something.

But keep in mind that while these devices may start proliferating, the device maker’s main goal must be considered, too. “The real ideal would be a button we can register with an app and have it trigger any action on the internet,” wrote Paul Miller on The Verge. “It would be the perfect way to make IFTTT physical. And it would likely do nothing for Amazon’s bottom line.”

The success of the Amazon Echo and Alexa, the device’s voice assistant, has been sensational for Amazon’s push into the smart home market. The launch of the AWS IoT button looks like another stab at the market, alongside a way for developers to get used to the AWS interface.

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tado° raises capital to feather nest – and pluck Nest?

German tech firm tado°, a smart home play focused on climate control, has announced that it copped nearly $23 million in its latest round of funding. This is in addition to the nearly $34 million raised previously.

tado° is focused on its primary Smart AC Control, a wall-mounted device that help turn remote-controlled air conditioning units into smart climate devices by linking them to a central control unit located inside the house that connects via the internet to your smartphone.

Using infrared technology, the same technology used in remote controls that come with portable air conditioners as well as window and in-wall units, tado°’s Smart AC Control is able to control multiple air conditioning units throughout your home.

It’s been a bit of a rocky time for smart home tech, with the bricking of Nest’s Revolv smart home hub. Consumers may be becoming leery about splashing out on new tech that may go dark before it pays off for them.

“We have had the benefit of seeing the hyperscale of Nest, and learning what has and hasn’t worked in their product line and marketing efforts — and clearly the Revolv hub was a failure, that not many other Smart Home innovators could afford to repeat,” tado° founder and CEO Christian Deilmann told ReadWrite. “At tado°,  we have a very clear product roadmap, and we’re committed to further evolving our product to satisfy this very large, underserved market.”

He added they’re reaching “millions of people around the world with remote-controlled heating and cooling units looking for a smart climate control option, which is not covered by Nest or comes at a cost significantly more than our products.”

How tado° works

What does this mean for users? It means that you can control your air conditioners from your smartphone wherever you might be, and you can set it up so that as you move from one room to another, the room’s climate control system activates ensuring that you use less electricity and have a comfortable space wherever you might be.

The Smart AC Control can also be set to turn you unit(s) on as you head back home from work. This feature set is remarkably similar to that of popular Nest thermostats, which are used to control central air conditioning units and has recently grown as a product line to connect a wide range of devices to the home network.

It is Wi-Fi enabled so it connects to the Internet through your home’s router, has Bluetooth capability which senses when you are home, contains humidity and temperature sensors, a capacitive touch surface for easy control, and an LED matrix which indicates which mode and status it is currently in.

This latest round of funding by tado° is intended to assist in its global expansion, especially into the US market. Recently, tado has added its products to Amazon, Best Buy, and Home Depot and partnered with AT&T in its Digital Life program.

tado° has a unique place in the connected home market. For the millions of homes that rely on smaller non-central heating and air solutions, it certainly has a lot of promise. CEO Deilmann said savings depend on the home and number of AC units installed but he estimated savings for a US household of $200 to $800 a year.

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How do cloud services platforms compare?

As the cloud services competition heats up between Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure, both companies have begun not only slashing prices, but expanding their offerings to cover more of what matters to today’s developers.

This includes Azure’s heavy investing into big data, while also taking steps to ensure that its users are able to develop on whichever infrastructure suits them best. If you think Microsoft Azure isn’t on board with Docker, think again. In particular, Microsoft Azure has also made strides within the open source community, releasing a certification for Linux on Azure in late 2015.

Amazon’s AWS has risen to the challenge in its own ways, offering new storage tiers, a one-stop-shop for IaaS and PaaS development, security, data management, high-availability load balancing, and its go-to standard EC2 container service.

In this corner: Microsoft Azure

Azure was something that wasn’t on very many developer radars at first. That is, until it teamed up with Mesosphere and Docker to create its own container scheduling and orchestration solution.1 The Azure Container Service entered general availability on April 19th, 2016 with developers able to access features such as Mesosphere’s DC/OS and Docker Swarm. These are particularly useful when working with microservices, running containers at scale in production, or utilizing containers in a testing environment.

Azure has been significantly focusing on its Big Data offerings, spearheaded by its Cortana Intelligence Suite. Azure utilizes elastic scaling in its SQL Data Warehouse, while users processing large-scale data workloads will want to consider signing up for a trial of Azure Data Lake. Data Lake offers users no fixed limits on file size or account size, with the ability to work with structured or unstructured data sets. SQL Data Warehouse offers enterprises looking to set up a hybrid cloud solution for their data flexibility in both storage and security.

For developers focused on building applications, Azure offers the ability to set up VMs with ease, without having to worry about manually scaling them. Azure auto-scales based on actual traffic, ensuring that applications will continue to function even under peak loads. Azure also supports nearly every common programming language, is the clear leader for .NET developers, and offers continuous deployment built into the platform. This means new code can be pushed at any time through GitHub, BitBucket, or Virtual Studio to ensure that crucial deadlines are met without issue.

And in this corner: Amazon AWS

Amazon AWS has a lot going for it when stacked up against nearly any competitor. Namely, its powerhouse of networking, storage, databases, and delivery/deployment options available to developers. Amazon EMR and Kinesis offer real-time data processing, along with the strength of the Hadoop framework. Developers can control their entire stack with AWS, making it an end-to-end solution ideal for enterprises with teams that are looking to manage and analyze their workflows from start to finish.

AWS offers customers not only EC2 for computing, but large-scale data storage such as S3 and Glacier, an ever-growing variety of databases to choose from, out-of-the-box deployment configuration, and load balancing. The benefit to utilizing AWS for many developers will ultimately be the insights, analytics, and level of control that AWS offers its users. By having access to the inner workings of one’s entire stack, enterprises can quickly drill down to locate problems and resolve them before end users are impacted by an issue, while bottlenecks or underperforming services can be isolated for review.

It goes without saying that the AWS cloud is also massive–Over 10x the size of its competitors. The size doesn’t affect its performance, as AWS has only experienced a handful of outages in its time. Overall, AWS has withstood the test of time, continuing to improve and upgrade its offerings to better serve their users while refusing to cut corners to do so.

Waiting in the wings: Google Cloud Platform

Google burst onto the cloud computing scene in a big way with the announcement of theGoogle Container Engine and its own Google Cloud Platform, which have quickly gained a dedicated following. Google Cloud is also one of the more affordable solutions, while offering its users a wealth of tools for working with Big Data, such as Google BigQuery and Cloud DataProc. The Google Container Engine gains a significant boost for those interested in usingKubernetes as their container solution, as Kubernetes is optimized to run on the Google Cloud Platform.

So who wins?

When choosing which cloud provider to work with, you must consider not only the amount of storage required by your applications or the amount of data processed, but the overall goals of your organization. Whether looking for an end-to-end solution, a container orchestration setup, or a way to quickly build and deploy applications, every business will have varying needs.

Ultimately, Amazon AWS is the way to go for enterprises looking for an end-to-end solution to their system management both front-end and back-end. AWS offers not only massive storage capabilities, but is available in the most countries with the least amount of outages, while continuing to make constant improvements toward improving its services.

Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform are attempting to close the gap, but they cannot yet compete with the features Amazon AWS offers for infrastructure management at scale.

This battle’s main casualty? Prices.

As the cloud computing war rages on, pricing across all three of these solutions continue to fall as they compete with one another. Microsoft Azure, Amazon AWS, and Google Cloud Platform all offer free trials, thus an enterprise development team can get a feel for each and see what will work best for their infrastructure. Amazon AWS continues to refine its pricing model to fit a variety of use cases, which makes it risk-free to trial in one’s own environment.

While the war between AWS, Azure, and Google shows no signs of slowing down, matchingyour organization’s overall goals with the solutions offered by a cloud provider is the first step toward streamlining your development workflow long-term.

Alex Miller is a business analyst at Clutch, a Washington, DC-based professional services and software consulting firm.

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How the Internet of Things helps build brands

Brands are poised to benefit greatly from the Internet of Things (IoT) over the next several years, as companies are being connected with their consumers in ways they never could before.

Engagement is at the heart of IoT. It isn’t a dusty server sitting in a back office, it isn’t your laptop or even your smartphone. It is a concept built around connecting the various items we interact and engage with throughout the day in a way previously only reserved for what we would describe as computers.

This means that brands have a variety of new methods by which they can connect with and deliver value to the consumer, and to create a lifestyle around interacting with their brand and the environment around consumers.

In much the same way that Michelin generated brand awareness and encouraged use of its tires by creating the Michelin Travel Guide, brands like Under Armour are becoming all-in-one solutions for customers that want to live a healthier and more active lifestyle.

Amazon and Under Armour taking a swing

Customers are buying Under Armour apparel, fitness trackers, and in return providing a ton of useful data to Under Armour to help them create new, targeted products.

The brand previously only associated with tight-fitting fitness apparel is now becoming synonymous with life goals: health and fitness.

Retail outlets like Amazon are branching out from their traditional sales approach and into IoT in a big way. Amazon has recently launched an entire line of products and services aimed at making their services accessible throughout your home. This includes buttons that place orders for common household products with a single press and actively-listening devices that respond to voice commands.

For consumers, this is a good thing. It means that you can get more value from the companies you do business with. They get to branch out and become better connected to you and your individual needs.

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What role will the government play in IoT?

As the Internet of Things (IoT) market begins to boom, we are bound to see the government take a more active role in investment and policing what is right and wrong in the industry.

That’s what an April 6 notice on the Federal Register by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) seems to suggest, asking for all parties involved in IoT to discuss with the administration about the evolution of IoT and shifts in global economies from the new technology.

See Also: Will IIoT Bolster Industrial Automation Investments? 

“NTIA seeks broad input from all interested stakeholders — including the private industry, researchers, academia and civil society — on the potential benefits and challenges of [Internet of Things] technologies and what role, if any, the U.S. government should play in this area,” said NTIA in the notice.

While it reads civilly enough, the U.S. government has shown a lack of enthusiasm for major projects like commercial drones, which we shut down by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in 2015.

That might worry IoT stakeholders that want to see the market grow unhindered. If new regulations or subsidies are set in place, it might change the dynamics of the market drastically.

Government trying to get a handle on IoT

Federal Times explains that the comments will be added to a green paper, which will be given to the government to “identify key issues impacting deployment of these technologies, highlight potential benefits and challenges and identify possible roles for the federal government in fostering the advancement of IoT technologies in partnership with the private sector.”

While IoT has been around for a decade now, it has only gained its bearings in the last three years. The growth in the consumer sector, with devices like Nest’s thermostat, Philips Hue, and Amazon Dash Button selling well, has brought more interest from all across the industry, which Gartner claims will balloon to 26 billion IoT devices by 2020.

It doesn’t appear to be a market desperate for government intervention, though no doubt some will argue for and against government assistance.

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7 Free Shipping Deals for Last-Minute Online Shoppers

Whether you're on a budget this holiday season or not, there's at least one offer no shopper can turn down: free shipping.
Going to brick-and-mortar retailers used to mean saving on shipping costs. Now, many online retailers are making it more cost effective to simply shop from your couch. (Consider money saved on gas and time waiting in long lines.)

See also: Amazon Raises Free Shipping Minimum for First Time in a Decade

We've all struggled through the last-minute mall excursion before. You spend more time looking for a parking space than you do shopping, and the store almost always has the perfect thing — at a different location "nearby." It's not like shopping in person helps with getting the right size, either. Unless of course, you're buying for yourself, in which case you should remember they call it the season of giving for a reason.
So before you spend your weekend trudging through the mall, consider these free shipping options for the U.S. and Canada this holiday season. They could save your sanity as much as your pocketbook.

Free Shipping Day: Dec. 18

In its sixth year of existence, Free Shipping Day marks a 24-hour stretch in which thousands of online retailers offer free shipping in the U.S. to customers with guaranteed delivery by Christmas Eve. Some of the offers and merchants won't be revealed on the Free Shipping Day website until 12:01 a.m. ET on Dec. 18, but 448 merchants have already signed up to participate, including REI, Sports Authority, and Neiman Marcus.

Free Shipping Day was the brainchild of Luke Knowles, the co-founder of FreeShipping.org. The day is something of a win-win, benefiting consumers but also driving sales and traffic to participating retailers. According to the website, Free Shipping Day helped produce more than $1 billion in online sales in 2011.
The site also includes Free Shipping Day in Canada, which takes place this year on Dec. 12 for those consumers looking to send gifts within the country.

Nordstrom

The upscale retail chain offers free standard shipping on all its orders in the United States, and not just around the holidays. Year-round free shipping delivers orders within three to six business days after processing. Known for having a stellar return policy — legend has it a customer in Alaska once returned a set of car tires to Nordstrom even though the retailer doesn't sell tires — Nordstrom allows users to ship returns back to the company free of charge. Buying an expensive piece of jewelry? Watch and jewelry orders over $1,500 are expedited in one or two days and insured at no additional cost.
The only bummer — free shipping doesn't apply to items purchased at Nordstrom Rack, the retailer's off-price chain.

Amazon

If you have an Amazon order totaling $35 or more, you may qualify for free shipping in the United States. Not all items on Amazon are included, and we've reached out to Amazon to see if there's a system for why some items are eligible for free shipping while others are not. Those items that are eligible — it will be clear at checkout whether or not you are receiving the deal — ship five to eight business days after the order is processed.
If this number seems higher than you remember, you're onto something. Amazon offered free shipping on orders of $25 or more for nearly a decade before bumping it up to $35 in October.

Best Buy and Target

Like Amazon, you have to spend money to save money with these retailers.
Best Buy has the best offer of the bunch, offering free, four to eight business day shipping year-round on orders of $25 or more. That's a pretty easy threshold to reach at Best Buy. A movie on Blu-ray (or two) should bump your shopping total over the necessary $25 limit.

Target offers free shipping on orders of $50 or more. If you use your Red Card at Target — also known as your Target credit or debit card — your shipping is free on all purchases.
The free shipping includes pre-orders on items like Xbox One games, which will automatically put you over the $50 total.

L.L. Bean

L.L. Bean, which sells clothing and outdoor gear, offers free shipping all the time, with no minimum on how much your purchase costs. The company even ships to Canada for free, a rarity for any type of international shipping. Items shipped to the lower 48 take two to five business days, according to the website.

Zappos

Zappos, the e-commerce shoe retailer, also offers free shipping on all orders shipped to the United States, regardless of total cost. Delivery takes four to five business days, and if you don't like your item, the company also offers free shipping on returns.

Barnes and Noble

For those who still love to curl up with a good book that isn't on a tablet, Barnes and Noble offers free shipping on orders of $25 or more anywhere in the United States. Of course, you can still get your Nook, the e-reader developed by Barnes and Noble, shipped for free, too. Shipping takes two to six business days.

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Nevermind Amazon's Drones, Groupon Has Catapults

While Amazon is talking up package drone delivery, Groupon is getting medieval on your ass.
The company is reaching back to the days of King Arthur for its latest innovation: catapults. If you see one in 2014, don't assume that you're about to get hit with a flaming bale of hay or a cauldron of oil. It may just be that package you ordered.

See also: Amazon Drones Will Deliver Babies Next

In all seriousness, the internal video was designed merely for a holiday season chuckle for Groupon employees. Still, not a bad idea if you happen to live within 50 yards or so of a Groupon distribution center.

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