A revolutionary new domestic set-up is soon to be tested in SA. Called the house of the future, it has enough computerised gadgets to make any techno-geek do flick-flacks of sheer, unadulterated joy.
The idea is that it will revolutionise the way houses are managed.
For starters, the fridge has a computer built in the door and from that PC one can access all products at home that are on its network, or check the contents off-site.
The washing machine and air conditioner can be activated from the office, so no pesky washing of clothes after a hard day`s work, or even a hot and humid house to come home to in mid-summer.
The microwave oven can be put on from the office too, so your dinner is ready when you get home, while the fridge - aside from the built-in PC - also has video input and a digital camera built in, so you can leave digital messages on the fridge instead of notes stuck on with magnets.
I can all but guarantee that at some point, I would send the wrong instructions to the devices which control all the important elements of the house and come home to find an e-disaster in progress in the place where I used to live.
Rodney Weidemann, journalist, ITWeb
Of course, while this is a wonderful idea and is probably the way homes will be operated and run in the near future, the cynic in me cannot help but ponder the darker possibilities.
If it were my own home, I can all but guarantee that at some point, I would send the wrong instructions to the devices which control all the important elements of the house and come home to find an e-disaster in progress in the place where I used to live.
Sooner or later I`d bugger up the temperature of the washing machine (by remote control, of course) and end up with clothes that are clean, but four sizes too small for even my niece`s Barbie dolls.
Or I`d set the wrong temperature on the air-con and come home to find poor Goldie the goldfish is now in the realm of the woolly mammoth - frozen in a chunk of ice that could have come from outer Siberia.
Worse still, I could see me forgetting to actually put food in the microwave, think I did and set it off at the pre-arranged time, only to come home and find that the kitten had gotten curious and I now have flamb'eed feline instead of saut'eed sirloin.
That`s without even getting into the consequences of downloading the wrong file to the built-in camera on the fridge, and having my significant other treated to the less than welcome sight of me doing something vulgar or obscene.
And if that sight causes us to break up? I can picture her hacking into my fridge PC and ordering thousands of Danish anchovies, cases of Beluga caviar and (just possibly) several dozen bottles of Pine-Nut cooldrink (does anybody really drink that stuff?)
Okay, so the home of the future probably won`t really be that bad, and I doubt that even a techno-moron like myself could truly mess up as badly as my worst-case scenarios suggest, but one thing I really do fear: coming home and finding that instead of all the lovely groceries you thought your fridge was going to order, all you have are several cases of Spam!
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