Control Your House From Your Smartphone With Revolv for iOS

As futuristic as it may still sound, syncing up your home's appliances and controlling them with your mobile device is science fact, not science fiction. Several products are on the market, but a new one stands out because it not only links up your whole house, it works in unison with your existing automated systems.
In July, Revolv, a Colorado company incubated out of the startup accelerator TechStars, announced pre-sales for Smart Home Solution, which makes your entertainment system, wireless lighting, automated locks, and thermostat all accessible and controllable via your iPhone or iPad.
 
For a one-time fee of $299 you get a Wi-Fi hub and access to Revolv's cloud service. You don't need an ethernet cable to link up. Just take the hub home and plug it into an outlet. It automatically connects to your Wi-Fi network and discovers all the wireless gadgets you've already installed in your home. You can manually add extras, and then turn appliances on or off from your mobile device. Revolv is only available for Apple products, but Android compatibility is on the way.
So what can you do with your new toy? Automate daily routines, like turning on appliances at set times, or use the service's GPS proximity and sensor triggers to automatically activate your devices. Revolv knows when you're close to your home because it tracks your geo-radius to the house. But, for once, being tracked may actually help you: You can program relaxing music to play before you step through the door — or set the oven to pre-heat so you can get a jump-start on dinner.

 
You can also mix and match devices and brands, so don't worry if you have different products, like Sonos wireless speakers or Belkin's WeMo home automation system. The only feature needed for a device to communicate with Revolv is wireless capability.
This functionality is what makes Revolv stand out from other home automation options already on the market. Many autonomous systems, while tying together appliances, don't work together.
Mike Soucie, Revolv's co-founder, says the idea was driven by peoples' desire to have more control over their home, and the products in them. Soucie tells Mashable Revolv isn't trying to make the hardware business obsolete. He says he wants to simplify things and bring the power of the web to everyday life, a term sometimes described as the "internet of things."
"What's been holding back the market so long is there hasn't been a point product," he says, referring to an automation device that can take the lead in both affordability and efficiency.
For Revolv to be successful, the functionality has to be simple, says Soucie.
"If it's consumer-based it has to be easy to use from the out-of the-box setup," he says.
Would you use a home automation system? How much would you pay? Tell us in the comments below.

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The iPhone 5C and the Allure of Shownership

When Apple introduced its less expensive version of the iPhone last week, many techies and tech followers — including me — groaned and poked fun at the shiny, toy-like designs. To me, the candy-colored bodies looked like a cheap marketing gimmick, a lazy throwback to iBook laptops from a decade or so ago. It seemed like a drastic diversion from the minimalistic, streamlined look that has become the norm for Apple’s current line of hardware products. I thought no one would want to buy them.
But a chance encounter with a stranger this weekend made me rethink my initial stance.

I walked into a sleepy Italian cafe to order takeout for lunch. After paying, I sat down to wait and pulled out my iPhone to respond to some text messages. The young cashier who rang me up watched wistfully. “I want an iPhone — I’m so sick of this thing,” she said, waving around a big gleaming boat of a Samsung device. “Really?,” I said, attention sharpened, going into reporter mode. She had minor complaints about the Android operating system, but mainly, she said, she just liked the way iPhones looked. I told her the new iPhones were going on sale in a few days and her eyes lit up and she nodded and said she wanted one of the color ones.
I told her that I’d been eyeing the gold one myself, even though I already had a perfectly good phone right now. She said the gold and silver ones looked nice, but that they weren’t flashy enough for her. Most people wouldn’t be able to immediately tell it was a gold iPhone simply by looking at it, she said.

 

 

“I want people to know that this is a new phone,” she said.
The interaction made me wonder if my knee-jerk reaction to the C-series phones was too hasty.
One of the iPhone’s biggest strengths has always been its branding as a luxury item, a device that lends its owner an unparalleled aura of cool and chic. Having the newest iPhone or iPad was an even stronger symbol of status. It is something that rival hardware makers have struggled to emulate and a reputation that could potentially be damaged with the introduction of a cheaper device, as my colleague Brian X. Chen reported last week.
But as the iPhone evolved from the third-generation 3GS model to the fourth and fifth, something interesting started to happen. It was virtually impossible to tell the devices apart. At a glance, the iPhone 4, 4S and 5 are practically identical.
Of course, that is partly because the current iteration of the iPhone is pretty good — and Apple doesn’t seem to see the need to improve on it very much, as Matt Buchanan over at The New Yorker wrote last week.
But perhaps Apple is starting to realize that even if they don’t need to make significant changes to their flagship phone, they still need to sate the desire of their buying base, who want to show off their phone hardware as much as they do a new pair of fall boots or a new handbag. Originally, that was the iPhone itself, then the introduction of the app store and the plethora of cool games and services you could demo to your friends. But the iPhone 5C, which is only marginally better than its predecessors, is designed to make people feel good about buying what is essentially an old phone, repackaged in colorful plastic. The psychology of the new, in other words. Because for better or worse, Apple isn’t just about ownership — it’s about shownership, and inspiring desire and jealousy in those around you that you’ve got the latest device.
Of course, this is just one story, just one take of thousands of possible anecdotes about the future of Apple and the iPhone. But it’s one that I will continue to mull over in the days before the next iPhone goes on sale.

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