History of Internet of Things

"Over 20 years ago a few professors at MIT began describing the Internet of Things (IoT) which is a world where interconnected Internet-enabled devices or ""things"" have the ability to collect and share data without human intervention." (Baltzan, pg. 3) To give a clearer explanation of what the Internet of Things actually is, we can describe it as a giant system that lets people all over the world interact with each other, as well as share and receive data on just about any topic that you could imagine.

It is actually quite amazing if you think about the things that the Internet of Things can actually do. From talking and even seeing family and friends who are in a different country, to your yoga mat telling you how many calories burned among other information, the Internet of Things is a truly remarkable entity. There are many ways that consumers, alongside businesses can benefit from IoT, as well as things that have not even been thought of yet, all of which are and will be extremely beneficial and important for our future.

According to Hewlett Packard Enterprise, ""43% of all IoT data will be processed at the edge prior to being sent to a data center by 2019, 38% of potential IoT economic impact requires interoperability between IoT systems, and 85% of organizations will have adopted IoT by 2019."" Just knowing this information, one could imagine the things that the Internet of Things has brought us and has yet to bring us. The Internet of Things has come a very long way in the past few decades. It has brought us Smart Thermostats, which gives homeowners real time information about the energy that they are using, as well as Smart Diapers, which include sensors that tell a caregiver if there is anything alarming about a baby be testing their urine; things such kidney problems, dehydration, and even signs of infection are just a few things that the diaper would alert a caregiver about. Smart Tennis Rackets are another thing that IoT has provided us with, which is a normal, functioning tennis racket that will give its player data from each and every hit taken, which then sends that information to the user's smartphone or computer. There is no telling what else the Internet of Things has in store for mankind.

Consumers can benefit from the Internet of Things in many ways. They are able to purchase items and objects that the Internet of Things has created, as well as improve their daily life by using those things. There is an article on entrepreneur.com by Puneet Mehta that is titled ""8 Ways the 'Internet of Things' Will Impact Your Everyday Life."" As the title suggests, it lists eight different ways that IoT will impact consumers lives, those being tuning your car, monitoring your health, energy consumption, driving and traffic jams, grocery lists, our morning alarm, monitoring your baby, and what's on your body. A few of these are more helpful and/or important than others, such as monitoring your health and monitoring your baby. The article says, about monitoring your health, that there may be prescription bottles that will actually notify your care physician when they are running low. Doctors may also keep tabs on how often their patients are taking their medicine which will be helpful in many, many ways. The article also says, about monitoring your baby, ""through their smartphones, parents will monitor their baby's breathing temperature and activity. Babies will don connected onesies that will send an alert when there is anything abnormal."" (Mehta, web.) This would be extremely helpful in keeping babies safe and healthy, by notifying their caregivers of problems that they may not show symptoms of, or simply problems that are just easily missed. The article says that this is also possible with pets.

Businesses can also benefit from the Internet of Things. IoT can easily improve small business's by making simple daily tasks easier, as well as help bigger businesses in the same way, as well as providing them with things that their customers may want to purchase. Salesforce.com gives us five ways that the IoT may make marketing smarter. These five ways are, ""Easy Exchange of Sales Data, Smarter CRM: Instantaneous Customer Analysis, Devices That Know They're Dying, Predictive Social Media, and Imagining a 100% CTR (Click Through Rate)"" (salesforce.com) This same website says, ""When Facebook and Twitter first hit the scene several years ago, most marketers were less-that convinced that these new ""social media"" sites would be worth targeting. We all know how well that turned out. Today, 74% of brand marketers report that they see a noticeable increase in web traffic after investing a mere 6 hours a week in social media marketing efforts."" (salesforce.com) This short paragraph is enough to show someone the incredible advance that the Internet of Things is making on technology as well as on mankind. It is also just a small part of how the Internet of Things is affecting business's today. One particular business that has been impacted in a positive way by the internet of things is AT&T. They have a section on their website titled ""IoT Products and Solutions: Find what fits your business needs"". Then, listed under this caption is a tab for Networks, Platforms, Professional Services, Asset Management, Vehicle Solutions, Smart Cities, Internet of Medical Things, Global IoT, and IoT for Good. Under each of these tabs there are even more links to click on that will bring you even farther into the Internet of Things within the AT&T business. One that someone may find particularly interesting is the Internet of Medical Things. AT&T describes it as, ""Transform healthcare to human care with AT&T IoT Solutions. Innovations in connected health help people live better lives, improve the operational side of healthcare, and are beginning to impact clinical applications and telehealth at a higher rate."" (AT&T, Internet of Medical Things)

If 50 years ago, someone said that mankind would come up with a device that would let you talk to someone who is thousands of miles away, let alone see that person, everyone would think that they were crazy. So just think about the crazy, unpredictable things that may be invented a short 50 years from now. ""The Internet of Things is reaching further into our daily lives by combining data from sensors in wearable devices and equipment with analytic programs to help improve the performance of individuals by gaining insights that were traditionally impossible to detect."" (Baltzan, 3) As one could gain from this passage, the Internet of Things will be extremely important for our future because of all of the things that it can and will be able to help us with. This includes but is not limited to letting us know about illnesses, giving us real time information on health and fitness data such as calories burned, calories taken, weight lost, and muscle gained. There is no telling what else the Internet of Things will have in store for the future, and it seems as though it will be interesting as well as intriguing to see where it takes us.

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