The digital home of the future is sure to include all these products and more. The big challenge for product manufacturers is to make everything work together without a fuss. Devices have to connect quickly to a home network, and it all has to be easy to manage.
Walk into a retail store or search online these days, and you’ll find a growing number of devices with networking capability: cameras, MP3 players, HDTVs, audio receivers and clock radios. Until these hurdles are overcome, consumers won’t fully embrace a digital lifestyle. The networked home is supposed to help people save time and/or money. It’s supposed to make it easier — not harder — for consumers to entertain themselves or lead more productive lives.
Seen from that angle, the digital home still exists mostly in the minds of product developers. Yet consumer-electronics and entertainment companies, dreaming of potential profits, are working hard to find stress-free solutions.