Industrial Automation Meets Home Automation Robotics Part One - By N.L. Belardes

I've met enough industrial automation super-tech-geeks (mostly sales guys) who use industrial automation equipment to run their own jimmy-rigged home automation setups. They power the lights, the jacuzzi, the temperature, television and DVD player. Even their showers turn on and off and the heat is regulated!

That's a lot of programming that non-Dilberts just aren't going to have the know-how for, and shows that some sales guys have some incredible spare time! But it's also a sign that home automation is real, is marketable, and that just because people in the industrial automation sector are the ones setting up such networks, doesn't mean your average Joe doesn't want to increase the laziness factor. Oops, I mean efficiency factor...

My question is, if industrial automation people are crossing over, and ease-of-use products are becoming more real, then when is an industrial automation company going to split and go way of the mainstream in home automation. OK, maybe that's still in the future.

Here's a video I shot of Hanson Robotics a few months ago at Wired's Nextfest in Los Angeles. When these doodads come out I wonder who will jimmy-rig one to a CompactLogix: