The Economist just published a special report on smart systems, which focuses on sensors penetrating all objects and their potential applications. According to the report, the proliferation of connected sensors and cameras, and of ubiquitous wireless networks, leads to a state that there is a virtual component to every physical object, like a mirror image of everything.
‘˜The real and the digital worlds are converging, bringing much greater efficiency and lots of new opportunities’ says Ludwig Siegele, the author of the report.
The report argues that a city can become truly smart, only when all its elements are connected, and it brings examples from smart cities where everything is wired up.
“Smart-city’ projects have been multiplying around the world. Some of them are not as new as their labels suggest, and in any case what exactly constitutes a smart city is hard to define. But they all have one thing in common: they aim to integrate the recent efforts to introduce smart features in a variety of sectors and use this “system of systems’, as IBM calls it, to manage the urban environment better’ .
The main sections of this report are the following:
- It’ s a smart world
- A sea of sensors
- Making every drop count
- Living on a platform
- Augmented business
- The IT paydirt
- Your own private matrix
- Sensors and sensibilities
Source: The Economist
Listen to an interview with the author of this special report