What is a Digital Kitchen?
I have a friend who installs digital media centers in people’s homes. These are wireless networks that transmit music, pictures, homework and other digital files to various locations from a central computer. You can store all your music, for instance, on an iMac or Windows (ugh) machine in a corner of your kitchen or family room
and then send the music to a Bluetooth (a short range wireless system) equipped stereo anywhere in the house. With the wireless network you can browse the Internet with a laptop on your counter, send a recipe to a wireless printer in your office, etc. The day is around the corner when you can tell your range to start cooking a meal from your office via the Internet. There is actually a range available that is both a refrigerator and an oven- stick your prepared dish in there and set a timer to shift from cold storage to 400 degrees at 4:30 and dinner is hot when you get home. Pretty crazy, huh?
The cool thing about this stuff is that it is here now and it works and it is easy to use, especialy if you go for Apple products (they come with all the software required at no extra charge). I know, shameless plug. Here’s another: check out the Tivoli compact stereo equipment. You can send digital music to it, its compact and you can have multiple systems- in the kitchen, in the bedroom, etc. One small remote handles it all.
This is really just the beginning. With a broadband (cable or DSL) Internet connection, an iCam and the same set-up across the country at grandma’s, your kids and their grandparents can video chat anytime for free, regardless of whether they’re thousands of miles apart! No more missing the kids growing up.
So what does this have to do with kitchens? They are the natural place to locate your hub computer. Video Chat with your sister in SF from NYC over coffee in the morning (assuming she’s an early riser). When you see this in action it’s amazing. And we’ll all be taking it for granted in the not too distant future. So start planning for it now or your new kitchen will be out of date, out of the box.
Martin