From Analog to Digital

by Carol A Westbrook

I gave my husband an Ember mug for Christmas. The Ember mug is artfully crafted, with its embossed monogram and satiny, comfortable finish. The magic of this mug is not its beauty, but the fact that it holds coffee or tea at a constant, pre-set temperature for over 2 hours. It’s great for someone who likes to linger over that second cup of coffee and carry it around the house.

My husband likes his coffee hot, so I set the mug’s holding temperature to 140°. While I was at it, I changed the color of the LED indicator light, just to see if I could. For this I used a cell phone app. I checked my phone to make sure that coffee pot was set to brew at 6 am, and that the house thermostat was set to increase the house temperature at 5:30 am from the low 60’s to the low 70’s, so we’ll be warm and toasty when we awake. And of course, the bread machine would have been busy since 4:00 am, making the breakfast bread. For dinner, I decided I will put a few things in the crockpot and program it to start cooking at 4 pm. I began to realize how our smartphones control so many things in our life; the Ember mug was just one more addition to our “Internet of Things,” or IOT. Read more »