this post was submitted on 02 Apr 2025
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[–] [email protected] 46 points 1 month ago (9 children)

Anything in my house smarter than the IKEA remote control light switch gets crushed with a hammer.

[–] [email protected] 53 points 1 month ago (4 children)

I mean, you could just use smarter stuff that's open source and has local API, or do what I do and build your own devices where you can ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯

[–] [email protected] 39 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (4 children)

Even there though, what is the actual point of a phone app controlled smart toilet, even if you open sourced the whole thing? Unlocking one's phone and tapping the app icon, and then presumably a button on the app, is going to take more time than one press of a lever that one is right next to anyway, and the latter doesn't present as many points of failure.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (3 children)

Well if you read the product description it was to allow AI Bidet control. However they had not received funding for AI so it was outsourced to a team of laborers in India using cameras and joysticks.

It also logged the consistency, frequency and matter samples from all BMs so you could make informed dedication opinions.

Spoiler/s

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago (1 children)

informed dedication opinions.

Hmmmmm

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Damn was supposed to be defecation autocorrect got me.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

Oooohhhhh, that makes sense.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

I heard they sold a license for the camera feed and controls access to EA for their next pay-to-play iOS game. The shareholders are really excited for this synergy.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago (3 children)

I have no interest in one, but playing devil's advocate, some might consider it more sanitary since you don't have to touch the toilet to flush and have the choice of not being near it, hopefully avoiding any spray.

Also, if your guests use the restroom, you can startle them at any time.

[–] mj_marathon 16 points 1 month ago (2 children)

How do the guests flush the toilet without the app? They have to ask you?

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 month ago

That occurred to me while writing my comment, as well, and I don't like the implications.

I would imagine they have to ask you, yes. If the toilet can be flushed without authentication, they'd probably still have to ask you how.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Of course. My roof, my water, my rules! /s

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 month ago (10 children)

more sanitary

Foot pedal flush really needs to become a thing.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Yeah, wouldn't want to get bacteria on your hands a few seconds before washing your hands.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Yeah I'd much rather spread poo particles all over my smartphone instead

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

The privacy issues are nasty, but a smart toilet could actually be an incredibly useful device.

Can you imagine if every time you went to the bathroom, your toilet could do some of the basic stool / urine tests you get at the doctor's office? Certain diseases could be caught extremely early, and you wouldn't have to do anything different.

And then there are bidet functions. Forget smearing poop all over your ass with paper, wash the poop off with nice warm water every time.

I wouldn't want to have to use a smartphone app for that, but there's no reason you couldn't have a simple set of buttons on the toilet itself. You could keep the manual flush lever and only use that if you preferred, but if you wanted an even better experience and a better clean, that option would be available.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Ok maybe the flushing part is a bit overkill and mostly a joke, but a toilet that can deliver notifications like if it's clogged for example before you use it and make it worse would have fantastic utility IMO

[–] mj_marathon 9 points 1 month ago (2 children)

This makes zero sense. If it's clogged, you'd know beforehand when you look in the bowl. Why the would anyone need a notification for that?

The ONLY utility that I could see here is if the notification logged who did the clogging so you could give them shit.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago (3 children)

Toilets can appear to have flushed fully, but still have...material...stuck in the U-bend that hasn't completely evacuated the toilet. A subsequent flush won't work, even though the water in the bowl is clean.

Ask me how I know.

That said, this could almost certainly be better-solved in other ways. Maybe by preventing the tank from refilling if there's still something in the u-bend (then you'd know it needed attention because there'd be no water in it)?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)
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[–] mj_marathon 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)
  1. We don't know that the toilet has this sensing capability.
  2. If it does, the actual fix is the same as if it were a regular toilet.

This just isn't an issue that needs technology as a solution.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

125% agreed. I was responding only to "If it's clogged, you'd know beforehand when you look in the bowl." I think there's potentially an engineering solution--a fluid dynamics engineering solution--but definitely not an app.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

A little display or indicator light somewhere on the toilet itself would be better than connecting it to some IOT app

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

But in this scenario don’t the toddlers need phones? Wait do toddlers all have phones now?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (3 children)

I guess, but I've never heard of a toilet clogging before it's used.

There's other better examples, though. Smart thermostats get plenty of use from the people I know with them. A fridge that tracks how long stuff has been inside would be dope. Smart lights have uses.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Stuff like openWRT routers get a pass.

If it has a local host API I would use it because it never has to connect to the internet.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago

People also just need to be more selective about where and how they automate.

For example, I wanted my coffee to automatically start in the morning. So instead of buying a "smart" coffee maker, I bought the dumbest possible one and a smart switch. Now, no matter what happens with that switch, the worst that can happen is I have to manually hit a button to get coffee.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Yes, I don't hate the idea of smart-ish devices, if they're not cloud-dependent in any way and have some kind of manual override.

It's kind of painful to have a kitchen full of devices each implementing their own half-assed OSs separately, or even more than once in one device.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I have a wifi-enabled garage door opener whose manufacturer discontinued the Google Home connection for so that you have to use their app and see their Amazon or Walmart ads. I also have a wifi-enabled alarm system whose manufacturer apparently doesn't care about Matter integration or whatever. So leaving the house in my car requires the use of two different apps (three if I also need to turn off lights).

In actuality I just use the physical buttons. But there was a time that I had a beautiful dream of getting a smart lock and setting my house up to lock the doors, close the garage door, and arm the alarm when I pushed a button in the car--and, more importantly, undo all of those things in reverse when I got home.

[–] tyler 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

with Home Assistant it doesn't matter if your device adds a Google Home connection, Alexa, Apple Home, etc. Exactly what 'smart homes' should be.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

I need to get on that, I guess.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

I wish I was this smart. We really want to do a smart light show using Xlights but every time I try to learn it I feel so frankly dumb.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)

You sent this message by manually sending radio messages, I presume?

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 month ago

No, it’s one of the few use cases of emacs.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

They were bonked with a hammer until they were below the proper "smart" threshold.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

Yeah, they’re about pakled intelligence now.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

Friends hate this one simple trick!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

Can you play DOOM on the light switch?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Have you tried our new Hammr and associated app? The smart tool that can analyze your work! Become more efficient! Compete with friends! Earn achievements! Track your heart rate! Now with several different modes...

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Reminder: never go have pancakes at wise_pancake's house.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

You’ll miss out on some primo maple syrup

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Same, the only thing talkings to the internet are my reverse proxy and the security cameras (only when viewing them from outside the local network, quite like what reolink does there)

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