Samir is a soft spoken techie from India… he was headed to the Hynes Convention Center in Boston to go to a conference on “Internet of Things” (IoT).  This intrigued me as I have heard this term used in the past and I have even seen job postings for this area of high tech… but what does it all mean?  Several months ago I picked up a women from Log Me In, a company located in the Innovation district in Boston whose company was working on this area and she had no idea what it was… hmmmm

Samir was great at explaining it… basically working through the internet it works with what is called “smart connected products”… so, the best way to think of this in layman terms is through products or services that you can control with your smart phone through the internet.  Examples might include watching your house while you are away through the cameras that are installed… yep, you can watch your kids throwing an open house while you are 1000 miles away!  Better yet… think of NEST, a company which offers a thermostat that you can control through your smart phone.

Wikipedia defines it as follows:
The Internet of Things (IoT) is the network of physical objects or “things” embedded with electronics, software, sensors and connectivity to enable it to achieve greater value and service by exchanging data with the manufacturer, operator and/or other connected devices. Each thing is uniquely identifiable through its embedded computing system but is able to interoperate within the existing Internet infrastructure.

I am sure that helps to clear things up… right?