LAS VEGAS – In the not-so-distant future, the Internet will link more than just computers. It will hook up everything from your toaster oven to your dog.
Such was the message of Cisco Systems president John Chambers to a capacity crowd of several thousand at the second keynote address to the Consumer Electronics Show.
"Everything will be connected, and I mean literally everything," rhapsodized Chambers, pacing the stage of the Las Vegas Hilton. "Not just electronic devices, but everything down to your piano. We'll have as many as four or five Internet devices on our bodies."
Chambers isn't the first to prognosticate on the networked home, but he speaks with considerable authority when it comes to Net technologies. An estimated 80 percent of all Internet traffic is carried over Cisco (CSCO) equipment.
Yesterday, the company, currently valued at over US$100 billion, announced plans to boost such home-networking systems by partnering with other companies to create an array of new high-speed home Internet connections and Net-linked appliances.
Chambers demonstrated the concept onstage using a mock-up of a living room. Using only a simple software program running on a Web browser, Chambers lit the fireplace, raised the window blinds, dimmed the lights, and got the self-playing violin and piano to perform a duet – all to applause from the admiring throng.
All these appliances, as well as a functioning phone, TV, and PC, were connected to the Net via a single cable. They could all be controlled remotely via wireless "Web slates" or dashboard-mounted Web browsers, said Chambers, enabling consumers to warm up the house and turn off the alarm on their way home. "Most devices connected to the Net will be non-PC devices," promised Chambers. He envisions the ultimate in convergence: Microwave ovens will have Web browsers built into their doors. Pets will be equipped with Net-connected tracking devices that will locate them on a map if they get lost. People will carry not just Web-connected pagers and phones but, say, heart-monitoring devices that will automatically alert their doctors in an emergency.
As the No. 1 seller of Internet equipment, however, Cisco obviously has a major stake in making such a future happen. "It's to his advantage to promote the concept of doing everything over the Net," said David Martin, who runs a Canadian company making interactive meeting-room products.
But there are still substantial roadblocks to the fully networked future. "There's still the problem of different devices running on different standards," Martin noted.
Cost will also be a factor. How expensive will it be, say, to equip your existing furnace to access the Internet?
"All of this home networking is being driven by an affluent, educated work force," said Dan Curtis, a Colorado investment manager. "How are people who can't afford all that technology going to keep up? It will definitely increase the divide between the haves and have nots."
Still, the Southern-accented, charismatic Chambers largely had the crowd convinced. After his lecture, Valerie and Tom Glass, Los Angeles-based technical consultants, were discussing how what they had just heard should influence the kind of wiring they get in their new home.
"We already buy stocks and shop over the Internet," said Tom. "The barriers are definitely breaking down. It may take a little longer than he thinks, but I think Chambers is right on."
Besides infiltration into the home, Chambers sketched out the huge changes he predicts the Net will continue bringing to business and society at large.
Cisco itself already handles most of its customer support, sales, and job applications over the Net, said Chambers. E-commerce will account for over $1 trillion in business by 2002, he predicted. And distance learning will revolutionize education.
"In short, the Internet revolution will have the same effect on society as the Industrial Revolution," said Chambers, "But it will happen not over 200 or 300 years, but over two or three decades."
