The Silent Intelligence: The Internet of Things

Daniel Kellmereit and Daniel Obodovski have captured the essence of a transformation that is happening all around us... silently. This isn't science fiction or wishful thinking. Our lives are already changing, quietly, dramatically, as evidence by the numerous examples in the book. Everyone should read this book so they can understand how machines talking to machines, or the Internet of Things is making our lives different and better today by improving what we do every day in our homes and in our jobs, easier, faster, more convenient, safer. It's also a good book for entrepreneurs and inventors who are looking to create new businesses around these amazing ideas. While this is a concept that began in 1999, when I finished this book, I felt that we are really only at the beginning of this new age, a revolution of machines.

The "two Daniels" have painted a good snapshot of the state of an industry that is finally starting to get some traction in mainstream applications. The idea of millions or billions of "things" reporting their status automatically via wireless means in ways that allow centralized or distributed analysis and, eventually, response and control actions is just becoming a reality. This book paints a good broad picture of how this (r)evolution may come about and the markets and technology forces that will come together to make this happen. The book reads like a kind of market research report, but without the multitudinous data tables and graphs that are typically found in those kinds of report. Based on a large variety of interviews conducted by the authors, they present an assortment of perspectives on this nascent market provided by a number of industry leaders who have watched the conception and birth of this next phase of interneting. The challenge to any book like this is that technology, markets and economies are moving so fast that the industry status changes very quickly and, thus, any snapshot is rapidly obsolete. Thus, the book does not go into depth about the specific technology challenges or economic drivers as these issues are very fluid and dynamic. The bottom line presented by the authors is that the new "internet of things" is happening now and that major markets are primed for embracing the benefits and values that this new capability provides.

Even though I have been involved in the M2M technology world for the last few years, I have found The Silent Intelligence to provide me with some new insights. I think the authors did a great job in connecting all the pieces of this complex ecosystem, how it is applied to various vertical markets such as automotive, manufacturing and healthcare, in a compelling, yet easy to comprehend way that anyone can understand. I was especially pleased to see them tackle the topic of the enormous amounts of constantly increasing amounts of data that the IoT world generates and how to make sense of it all. I also appreciate their frank appraisal of some of the issues we still face in the M2M world, such as fragmentation and data sharing.

The writing itself is engaging and easy to understand, while very informative. I also enjoyed the way they weaved quotes from industry experts to validate their points.

I for one am looking forward to the day when my car drives me autonomously to my office, while my house knows to reduce energy consumption while I'm away and start the dishwasher later in the day, and my watch reminds me it's time to have a solid, carb-full lunch because I'm scheduled for that 30 mile bike ride later in the afternoon! Thank you to both authors for painting that picture of the possibilities with this book.

Appreciated the honesty and the courage of the authors for undertaking the task of listing the ways in which the internet of things would change the world that we live in-both in good and in bad ways . The book does not go into too many details about the issues arising out of the loss of privacy and personal space; the loss of integrity that is an inevitable effect of the loss of ownership of intellectual property that arises when your ideas are no longer your own to keep and use or at best yours to own for a minuscule iota of time; and the loss of security which is of very real concern in a world where national borders are porous at best, and where hacking, and other ways of maliciously manipulating information have become a fact of life. The book which is written by people who are technology enthusiasts places a greater emphasis on the many miracles that can be wrought by the ubiquitous presence of the internet which will envelop and engulf us in all aspects of life...from which it seems there is no escaping from. The internet of things will gradually engulf, envelop and morph into an invisible, invariant aspect of the modern, connected society that we are all being led into.
-Firstly loved the authors attempt to initiate a dialogue about the effects of adopting the internet of things by outlining the myriad ways in which the internet would become integrated into everyday life in the modern world. Many of the technologies, the methods, and the means by which the internet would pervade everyday life are still not fully understood or comprehended by the members of the general public. So for this effort the authors need to be lauded for their honesty in outlining and listing the many technologies that are currently being unveiled or that are due to be unleashed soon.Read more ›