The Internet of things will not arrive in 2014

I call it the “year of the whatever” phenomenon. Tech pundits and industry trade groups love to say that next year, or the year after that, is going to “the year of” fill-in-the-blank. Way back in the 1990s, there was going to be the year of the laptop (it finally happened.) There was going to be the year of virtual reality and 3D (it didn’t) and the year of the smartphone, which is turning out to be the decade of the smartphone.

Next up is “the year of the Internet of things,” and a world of 20 billion (or is it 30 billion?) connected devices. As I hit the end-of-year tech events hosted by the likes of Cisco Systems and Broadcom, there was endless talk about the utterly connected world, and now there’s even a new trade group — the Allseen Alliance — that will talk standards and do its best to ratchet up the hypemeter.

[ What is the Internet of things, really? InfoWorld’s Galen Gruman cuts through the hype. | For quick, smart takes on the news you’ll be talking about, check out InfoWorld TechBrief — subscribe today. ]

With visions of profitable hardware and software sales dancing in their heads, Intel and other tech giants are dedicating engineering, marketing, and executive talent to new internal groups aimed at pursuing products and sales for the Internet of things. Wireless engineers and developers take note: There are going to be lots of jobs here.

Cisco, which has more to gain than almost anyone if the network expands to cover almost everything, is of course a charter member of the Allseen Alliance and even has a vice president with the awesome title of General Manager of the Internet of Things. His name is Gudo Jouret and he figures that driverless cars are part of the brave new connected world. Although he’s not quite ready to declare “the year of the driverless car,” Jouret makes a bold prediction, saying that “in five to seven years, most of us will have to pay more for driving ourselves,” because human drivers are worse insurance risks than computer-controlled cars.

Mighty bullish. But then when you’re talking about 30 billion new devices, you’d better be bullish. And not worry so much about what might get in its way.

The Internet of things will cause more global warming

One of those “year of” things that’s not so much fun to imagine is the “year of global warming,” and sadly it’s getting awfully close. Although you might not see the connection, the Internet of things could make a bad thing even worse, says Cisco CTO Dave Ward. “By 2018 or so, 120-megawatt data centers will be scattered around the U.S. and Europe.”

That’s because all of those 20 billion devices — plus all the other digital stuff already in use — will have to be powered by something and connected to a powered network, which is, in turn, connected to a powered data center.

Unless those data centers are powered by green energy, or someone finds a way to keep them from being built, their huge power demands will make a significant contribution to global warming. And given yet another new trend, “green fatigue,” I’m not confident that we’ll really see the widespread deployment of green data centers in time to make a difference.

The Internet of things is too big to manage or secure

Then there’s the issue of managing so many devices. Although the industry is generally quite optimistic about IPv6, which in theory can supply an almost unlimited number of addresses, it still hasn’t been widely deployed, and the transition could be tougher than anyone cares to admit.

Addressing issues aside, what about moving data to and fro among billions of devices? It’s quite a challenge, and here’s where Cisco has embraced another “year of” sort-of-thing: fog computing. Cisco defines that new buzzword as “the convergence of networking and compute at the edge of networks to create a more distributed intelligence that balances the need for centralized megascale data centers with more locally useful computing and decision making capabilities.” Not exactly local, not exactly cloud — fog.

Then, of course, there’s the Sisyphean task of securing so many devices. Indeed, Symantec has already discovered a worm that targets the Internet of things. Security vendors are of course salivating about something new to portray as a threat, with the cries about mobile doom and gloom still not happening; Boxtone this week announced its Internet of things security management tools, for example.

In the Internet of things, every user becomes an admin — oh, joy!

Closer to home, as in the user’s home, there’s this: “We’re about to hit the ceiling of what people are willing to babysit,” says Mark Rolston, chief creative officer at Frog Design. “How many devices do you want to try and keep alive and awake throughout the day?” What with linking devices, entering passwords, managing home Wi-Fi, and dealing with corporate IT departments at work, connected life is already hard for some users — “They are network admins, by accident,” Rolston said during a session at last month’s Open Mobile Summit.

Still, that’s not stopping developers for looking at new things to put on the Internet — your garage door, for instance. Why your garage door? Suppose you just got to work and you have one of those Homer Simpson moments: “Doh! I didn’t close the garage door. Or did I?” A company called Chamberlain showed off at a Broadcom event a device called MyQ that includes a rather ingenious sensor that detects the position of the door and it lets you know its status by virtue of a smartphone app. If it’s open, you can tell it to close.

If you’re unlucky enough to deal with the craziness of CES next month, you can be sure you’ll see lots more gadgets like that garage door opener. (Broadcom, in case you wondered, makes the chips in the sensor.)

Actually, that MyQ gadget is kind of cool, but I’m not sure the world needs billions of devices like that.

I welcome your comments, tips, and suggestions. Post them here (Add a comment) so that all our readers can share them, or reach me at bill@billsnyder.biz. Follow me on Twitter at BSnyderSF.

This article, “The Internet of things will not arrive in 2014,” was originally published by InfoWorld.com. Read more of Bill Snyder’s Tech’s Bottom Line blog and follow the latest technology business developments at InfoWorld.com. For the latest business technology news, follow InfoWorld.com on Twitter.