'Father' of the iPod unveils new gadget after ten years - and it's... a thermostat?
Daily Mail / October 25, 2011
Tony Fadell led the team that designed the iPod at Apple, and contributed to the start of the iPhone project.
He's often described as the 'father' of the iPod.
But when the former Apple executive's new 'stealth' start-up finally unveiled the product it was working on, it raised a few eyebrows.
Nest is a 'Learning Thermostat'. ... Nest doesn't 'learn' once then switch off, either - it keeps 'learning'. ...
How Peak Oil does alter our priorities.
Ex-Apple Leaders Push the Humble Thermostat Into the Digital Age
By STEVE LOHR / NYT / October 25, 2011
... There are other digital thermostats on the market, like the Honeywell Vision Pro and the Filtrete by 3M. Yet they have been slow to catch on, and their features often go unused because they are ungainly and people find them difficult to program, said Russ Donnici, president of Mechanical Air Service, a heating and cooling contractor based in San Jose, Calif. By contrast, the Nest product is small, and temperatures are set by turning its outer ring and pushing in the ring until it clicks. ...
... Unlike other thermostat manufacturers, Nest Labs has a sizable team of specialists in the branch of artificial intelligence called machine learning, including Yoky Matsuoka, who came from Google and whose work won a MacArthur Foundation award. ...
http://www.nest.com
