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Technology

Nifty Kitchen Appliances 166

Posted by emmett from the food-a-rack-a-cycle dept.
Project Gamma writes "Techserver reports about how being lazy just got easier. Too lazy to read the directions on that TV dinner? Soon you may not have to. Your microwave oven will do it for you with the swipe of the package bar code across a special sensor." Okay, fine, but will it E-mail me when it wants me to stir it?
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Nifty Kitchen Appliances More

Nifty Kitchen Appliances

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  • Will it know what you meant? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Privacy is very important. Guard against it's abuse.
    Grammar is very important.Guard against its neglect.
  • Ok, so with E-Commerce, and now this, all we need to do is find some way of automatically getting the food we buy over the internet into the Microwave, which will automatically know how to cook the food and will tell you when it is ready. Hmmm. Maybe some way of getting it to your computer desk too, already tipped out onto a plate.

    We need transporters. Come one, scientist type guys, help us out here.


    T.
  • Tea, Early Grey - Hot!

    Bah... gimme Kirk:

    "Beer. Romulan. Cold."

    :-)

  • Kitchen Filk (Score:3)

    by jd ( 1658 ) <imipak@yahoGINSBERGo.com minus poet> on Monday January 17, 2000 @07:15AM (#1365263) Homepage Journal
    Oh dear, what can that matter be?
    That my microwave cooked for me?
    It looks like a Star Trek entity.
    The bar code reader's gone spare.

    Put the right bar in;
    Pull the right bar out.
    In, out, in, out, I really want to shout!
    The microwave's on strike and has just begun to pout;
    That's what lunch is now all about!

    Sing a sing of kitchens,
    The scanners all awry.
    Four and twenty readers Quake-ing a pie.

  • Like it's difficult to
    1) Remove contents from box
    2) Open microwave door
    3) Put foodstuff in microwave
    4) Close door
    5) Hit "Nuke for 5 minutes" (or however long)
    Freakin' laziness... With a heftier price tag. Just what I need. Not.
  • ...till we have a conduit from the smart fridge to the smart microwave and the fridge's loading bay opens into the hallway where the supermarket delivery bots can access it?
    --
  • Yea. Just what we need.


    "It does all the thinking," Daniel said.


    As if the people of the world spend too much time thinking as it is.


    Come on people. We can spend a few minutes of the day thinking. . .Hasn't anyone here spent some time actually cooking a whole meal? It's pretty fun. Not to mention, it actually tastes better cuz it was something you actually worked on.


    ** Martin

  • This is *not* just for slobs, this is also for those of us who are just plain lazy! (G)
  • Actually, there are those [cnn.com] who wants to see this happen soon (except for the brain-fry). They want a web-appliance on your fridge. I still have a hard time seeing why I would need this, but hey, who knows what people wants?

    Lars
    __
  • I don't think the idea of a microwave oven cooperating with the frozen dinner will happen. Sure, the technology works (and I actually can't see why a university has to be involved to make it happen), but it needs cooperation from too many entities: more than one.

    My parents still have a VCR with a bad code reader. The Swedish version of TV guide carried full page ads with bar codes for a couple of years, making it possible to drag the bar code pen across a few lines and then beam the data over to the VCR using infra-red light. It was cool, but it required someone to publish the bar codes for the most popular TV programming every week and this is expensive, so naturally it died a premature death.

    Similarly with a cheaper coding scheme. Some papers used to have ~10 digit code by the program title which encoded the essential data for the VCR. But who wanted to make sure that those codes were right? Seems that idea died too.

    I believe that successful technology development evolves from existing technologies. For instance, I discovered this fall that my new VCR could set the time all by itself. It simply use the time info sent out in the text-TV data. That is an excellent use of an existing technology!

    Lars
    __
  • Not unless you plug it into a phone. Where are the privacy violations? Honestly - does the FBI care what you eat? "Oh my god, that kid on 3rd and Elm in the white house has loose stools!!!"

    Comeon, the worst security exploit would be a buffer overflow in the cup-o-noodles module.

  • That's why a lot of people (or maybe just me) throw some random item in the cart to screw up the statistics. If you throw in enough items that aren't in your marketing demographic, it might confuse the junk-mailers and such enough that you'll be left alone for a little while.

    And of course you shouldn't use your real name, address, etc. when filling out the form for the card in the first place. Duh. And don't pay with credit cards! Make sure you use cash when you're getting those cereal discounts, baby food and Depends! You don't want Them to know where to find you, eating your Cap'n Crunch.
  • This will be good when it's built into my freezer. Then I can send an inquiry to the freezer to see what I've got, then order it to cook dinner before I leave work. Get home to a hot plate. Mmmmm...

    Really, I've been learning Python this weekend, and the annoying thing hasn't been getting up to nuke a meal, or deciding how long. It's been the interval while it nukes... To be able to set a schedule for dinner production in advance, with or without polling for confirmation, that would be cool.

  • Re:Not a completely bad idea... (Score:3)

    by jabber ( 13196 ) on Monday January 17, 2000 @07:03AM (#1365276) Homepage
    Right, and if there's a built in barometer, it could adjust cooking times for your altitude.

    Wow, with a beouwulf cluster of these, you could effortlessly run a cafeteria.
  • Advanced tea substitute, perhaps?

  • The Sharp microwave requires a separate PC that can be in any room. The recipe is downloaded into a data box, which is then connected to the microwave.

    Uh oh. I bet they only support one specific OS for that part. What OS would that be? Let me guess... Hmm... RT11?


    ---
  • Eventually, it could be connected to a touch-screen computer that allows access to the entire Internet - including everything from nutritional information
    about the meal being cooked to weather and news reports - said Rutgers University researcher Kit Yam, who is helping to develop the technology.
    I really don't see the desire for a PC in my microwave. I just don't see the market for news and weather in a kitchen appliance.

    But the part about tailoring the recipes for the specific microwave is nice. That "cooking times may vary" thing has always bugged me.

  • Who cares if it emails the surgen general, I'm more worried that it will notify X corp that I ate Y dinner at Z time. Just imagin the potential for marketing and harasment. "How about some pie to go with that dinner your having right now? You can pick some up at the local 7-11 down the street." It's bad enough that most stores can track your purchases if you use credit or debit cards to pay for them. Same goes for those store discount cards. Reminds me of Max Headroom.

    Privacy is very important. Guard against it's abuse.

  • on television or in a magazine.

    I'd rather have a microwave with a microphone that automatically shuts off when popcorn is as done as it's going to get.

  • I have a button on mine marked, simply, "Reheat". I hit that and press start and it will detect heat and steam from the food and shut off. So far, it's worked perfectly every time.
  • while you're waiting, you can read /. and fry both your food and your brain at the same time.


    ~~~~~~~~~
    auntfloyd
  • Sorry, that senor should be sensor, I was typing a little too fast ;-)

    -Jeff
  • This is not needed. Do you really want to have to wait for your microwave to contact a website and ask it for directions to have your meal? I know I wouldn't.

    Panasonic has had sensor microwaves out for years. I've got one. It's great. All you have to do is cut a slit on the tv dinner plastic wrap, put it in the microwave oven, and go through the sensor menues: frozen food -> and then either Frozen Entree or Frozen Dinner, and the senor in it automatically determines when it's done from the amount of steam comming off of the food. It's really convienient. And a much better idea than scaning the barcode. I have rarely gotten food that has been cooked too much or too little with this microwave oven. Also, it has a sensor reheat function. No more guessing how long you should put last nights pizz in the oven.

    Sharp also has some cool microwave ovens. They've got cooking instructions built into it. I've used one before and I'd buy one if my panasonic oven stops working. It's got a sendor reheat and sensor defrost function too. You should check them out.

    I know you can get the sharp microwaves from http://www.appliances.com [appliances.com] but I don't think they sell the panasonic microwaves anymore

    Well, it's time to go reheat last night's pizza for my lunch now ;-)

    -Jeff
  • Also - Not to be a downer or anything - but this was reported on CNET and AP news about a year or so ago...

    Geez, it was even in last month's issue of Consumer Reports



    --

  • It won't take long before someone in the geek compound would scan a barcode for the 30 minute microwave product, stick it on the 5 minute tv dinner so your sulsbury steak turns to charcol. All this for a laugh.


  • Not a completely bad idea... (Score:3)

    by kramer ( 19951 ) on Monday January 17, 2000 @06:58AM (#1365288) Homepage
    Sure are first glance it sounds like a totally bullshit idea. But let's be honest, who hasn't burned something in the microwave because of ambiguious instructions like "heat on High for 3 to 6 minutes"?

    If the Microwave showed a little bit of intelligence and took into account the wattage of the microwave when computing cooking time it could save a lot of guesswork when working with an unfamilar microwave or when cooking something you've never cooked before.
  • If you ever give them real info (such as paying by check, ATM card or credit card) in the same transaction as you use your club card, you've just
    de-anonymized every club-card purchase you've ever made, and every one you ever make in the future. Doesn't that just make you feel all warm
    and fuzzy inside?

    So why not just use the dodgy-details card when you have cash, and leave it in your pocket when you have to pay with a card/cheque?

    Personally I don't bother with reward cards at all, for two reasons:
    1. The privacy implications rub me up the wrong way, even if I could avoid them myself

    2. If I started on that road, I'd end up with twenty of the fscking things and would require a second wallet
  • The only thing the corporations will do is send you coupons based on what your microwave says you've been cooking. This happens already in a variety of ways. And if Tyson chicken sees that my house cooks 6 boxes of chicken nuggets a week and wants to send us coupons for nuggets and other assorted Tyson chicken products, that's fine with me.

    -B
  • And my parents used to complain about me sitting too close to the tv.....
  • Yup. I'd hope it'd be able to memorise *how* I like my lasagne anyway - that it wouldn't be many trips to Sainsbury before it cottoned on, so I'd be able to tailor my own "frozen -> cremated" range for myself.

    Of course, your problem of variability of temperature throughout the lasagne is a sign of not having evolved the art far enough: you should douse it with a bit of water (so the base gets evenly hot all over) and regularly break it up into chunks distributed around the perimeter of the plate - e.g. after 2 mins from frozen, hack it up & redistribute, etc.

    Share and enjoy ;)
  • It's a government censorship conspiracy: you must have a PC in your microwave so that when you start looking at dodgy sites, you get burnt :)
  • Maybe it will try to reduce my calories.
    Maybe it will email the Surgeon General if I
    start to eat unhealthy foods. Hate to have
    a Health and Human Services SWAT team raid my house.

  • That's a very good idea. In the same vein, wouldn't it be easier, less obtrusive, and more accurate to have a meat thermometer hooked up to the microwave? One would only need set target temperature.
  • With the small point of NOT BEING ABLE TO PUT METAL IN A MICROWAVE overlooked, your suggestions are otherwise fantastic.


    ------------------------------------------------ ----------
  • Funny this should crop up right now. I'm currently in the process of implementing a great deal of the features mentioned in that article in my own house. Of course, I'm only doing it for the entertainment value, not for the purposes of convienence.

    A barcode scanner will record in an inventory database all food products purchased and those
    thrown away. Before you go shopping, you program a menu database with the recipies of the meals you want to eat for the next week, or however long you wish to stock up for, then it prints out a grocery list for you, cross referencing what you already have, along with impending expiration dates.

    For general consumables, like sodas, apples, etc,
    The program will keep statistics of how long it takes you to consume them, then predicts when you will likely run out and adds them to your next list.

    Integrating the microwave, stove, and oven to the computer is a piece of cake. For microwaves, and many stoves and ovens, the interface for it is already a computer, all that is required is changing the input source. The advantageous part, and orders of magnitude more difficult, would be complete mechanical automation of the cooking process. Program in a recipe, and come back an hour later when its done to eat it, and let robotics take care of the mixing, inserting and removing items from the oven/microwave, etc. This
    isn't impossible, and could probably be done easier with a less conventional design. Perhaps a fully integrated system where the oven, burners, microwave, refridgerator was all a single homogenious system...

    Anyways. I'm rambling. When I have something to show for it, I'll let you know.

    -Restil
  • I love how technology flips sides after a while. Used to be the microwave was the luxury item, only the rich folks had them and everyone else "had" to cook the old-fashioned way. Now all the Common People throw the Wal-Mart E-Z-Cheez in the nuker and only rich folks have the time/luxury to plan their meals and cook on the stove!

    (Well, at least that's what it looks like from going to Williams-Sonoma and reading the dream-kitchen articles in Sunset magazine. :-)

  • It's redundant because it simply rehashed what was said in the article's summary without adding anything of value. I agree that normally, "redundant" first-posts are contradictions in terms, but this one was properly moderated.
  • t's bad enough that the shopper-privacy-invasion card (or your ATM card, or your checking account number) keeps track of everything you buy, this would let Big Business see exactly when you ate it.

    This is already happening in the US with supermarkets that provide certain UPCed cards that give the consumer a discount on some items while simultaneously logging all items purchased in a central database. It's mostly used for tracking trends on a population scale, but the privacy implications for individuals are still immense.
  • > heat in your microwave on its highest setting for
    > 4 seconds per watt of your microwave

    Strange:

    No microwave -> Dinner is ready immediately
    Very powerful microwave -> please wait for an hour or two.

    To be honest, I prefer the instructions in old cookbooks:

    Cook till done.

    But then, I have no microwave oven.
  • Now that I think about it, that's just about the only reason to have a microwave hooked up to the internet. What's so incredibly hard about inventing a UPC coding scheme that would code "Cook 55 seconds; rotate 180 degrees; cook 45 seconds"? It would only take a few bytes and it would kick the middle man. "Whoops, network's down, guess that ramen'll have to wait."
  • I would not say I was joking but more poking fun at what may happen. I have heard a mention in the news of a FAT tax, where they want to tax corporations for producing fattening foods. No matter how much you say you are taxing corporations in the end you are taxing the people. So if we just monitored what went in and out of the fridge for who, then tax it, we would at least have an honest tax instead of a false tax on corporations.

    Honestly I hope none of it ever happens.

    BTW, I ran the Fat Boy Club on my ship when I was in the Navy. This meant since I was in such good shape (I was a Search and Rescue Swimmer) I had to lead the fat boys in getting in shape. Many did not want to get kicked out of the Navy and listened (others thought I was a sick, sadistic Nazi). The only diet I saw work well was getting the people addicted to working out with free wieghts while watching what they ate. That simple. Hell it made them feel good, they were so big they were already strong, just had to show how to focus the energy. Do it 21 days in a row, feel the endorphines everyday, and you will love it also.

  • How about a FAT TAX. For every gram of fat listed on the box of the food you are going to consume a tax is taken to pay for the "impact on society" of you being a fat ass and the stress or potential stress you will place on our health system. Simply hook up all possible devices we can use to consume and track who eats what.
    "Well Debbie if you had not eaten all those HoHo's back on '01 you wouldn't have this problem would you?
    Hmm no it wouldn't be that way. Since obviously all corporations are forcing us to do horrible things like smoke cigarettes and eat fatty food all the taxes will come from the evil corporations. But wait since corporations only collect taxes we will still be stuck with the FAT ASS TAX.

    Ahhh or how bout the pre sex machine.
    "here ya go babe, swipe that imprinted bar code on your arm across this scanner and lets check you out"
    Of course there will be a tax for this machine.
    A sex tax. Boy the goverments will get rich then huh. Well maybe not from this group.
  • ... until I read the article. Why does this have to involve the internet? Some kind of lame attempt to cash in on a buzzword?

    There aren't all that many parameters to store- how long to cook and at what power, when to pause and restart, how long to let the food sit after it's done cooking. That info could be stored in the oven (maybe the barcode could be a hash of those parameters) or even in the barcode itself.

    A device this complex (contact the company for instructions over the internet??!) will never catch on.
  • I'm gradually getting tired of these no-brain "inventions" which serve the money and not the people.


    Me too. Yet everytime someone invents another worthless piece of junk (IMHO) like this, it's touted as being something worth it. At least they don't call it the next best thing since sliced bread, but that's because we all know it isn't. "Advances" like these are simply recessions into the pit of human desparity; we don't need anything more to make us lazy. If you're having troubls using a microwave, then get off your butt and read the instruction manual. If that doesn't work, then learn from experience. If that doesn't work, cook everything yourself.

    Ok, so maybe none of those choices work. The thing is, this is pointless! It's insane! It's inane! I can't believe that any self-respecting person would use this, simply because I, in my twisted world of thought, see inventions such as these to be superfluous and extremely ridiculous.

    It serves money more than people, because it's one of those gizmos that may have some flash-bang, but don't have real usefulness. How many people are going to want it to look up all sorts of directions on how to cook their food. Does everybody want their food cooked the same? NO! And as someone else has mentioned, if you're on the net with it, could you not be hacked? Now, I have no real ideas as to what that would bring for the user/owner, but I wouldn't want to find out either. The real usefulness of these things is to take more money out of your pocket, and if they're ever actually bought.. then they've served their purpose. You might as well throw it away.

    Just my.. $0.002 worth
  • Of course, everybody who has taken a science class knows that this is a fallacy. The idea that because you are buying a box of Cap'n Crunch every two days and you never buy toothpaste (As far as they know) does not mean you will have bad dental hygene. Last year, i bought a big big pack of toothbrushes and a big big pack of toothpaste at costco - and i won't be buying toothpaste or toothbrushes for a long time because i have enough. Point is - i am still maintaining my dental health. They cannot infer from your purchasing records what are activites are - and are liable to be sued if they do.
  • Don't you gius watch TV?

    GE (or somebody) already has a commercial for a fridge like this (general topic, web enabled appliance).

    A repair guy shows up at the door to fix a fridge that has not broken yet.

    Sort of a reverse of Tom Tuttle in the movie Brazil

  • I heard about a project like this a few years back, although I believe they were encoding the timing on the barcode, not a url. Privacy concerns aside, this is terrific for people with sight disabilities. If you can't read the instructions on the box, there's no way you can cook the meal, which reduces your ability to be self-sufficient. Doug
  • if they use 2d barcodes...
  • Has anyone seen the VCR programming device at Walgreens (or whatever your favorite, local pharmacy/everything store is)? It is like a device you set the start and stop time for a show, set the VCR for the channel, and place it in front of it, and put a tape in the VCR. Basically, what it does is hit "record" for the VCR (at the start time), then "stop" on the VCR (at the stop time).

    Yes, peabrains amongst us! You too can pay $29.95 for a device that duplicates what you already comes standard with your VCR (provided you can get past the clock flashing 12:00)!

    People are so fucking stupid!
  • I have eaten a TON of TV dinners in my life. One thing I have noticed in the course of heating these dinners in the microwave, are the following:

    1. Most microwave ovens are in the 800-1000 watt range. Depending on where the microwave is on the scale, times may need to be adjusted up or down by a half minute or so.
    2. Never heed the directions on a TV dinner - most of the time, they are WRONG.
    3. Always use high - despite what the dinner says, doing shit on medium doesn't work - use high, and nuke for HALF the time.
    4. Banquent and Swanson TV dinners works the same - for standard 14 oz size, leave all plastic wrap on, no holes, nothing, and nuke for 4.5 to 5 minutes, turning once - do not let sit, eat immediately.
    5. For Hungry-Man style dinners, all wrap on, 5 minutes, turn, 5 minutes.
    6. Swanson Pot Pies - put in a bowl to catch drips, poke holes in top - nuke 4.5 to 5 minutes.
    7. Marie Callendar Pot Pies - leave in box - do not open box. Nuke 5 minutes (for small ones), 10 minutes for large sizes.
    8. Do not nuke pizza - it sucks. Use the damn oven.
    9. Leftovers - most can be cooked in two minutes, but depending on the amount of food, may need longer. Plastic wrap helps keep in steam (esp for stuffing). Stirring after heating is a good idea.
    10. Do NOT reheat biscuits for more than 15-30 seconds on high (unless you like hard biscuits).
    11. Bacon - high for 1 minute per slice.
    12. Do not reheat pre-made burgers (ala Bugerking) with mayo on them - they suck.
    13. Do not heat non-microwavable french-fries.
    14. It is possible to fry an egg in the microwave - here's how: Take a saucer, and grease it with vegetable oil. Heat it in the microwave on high for 1 minute. Carefully remove and break an egg on it. Bust the yolk. Heat on high for 1-2 minutes, until done. You might want to cover with a tent of paper.

    That is all I can think of. If you want more tips, reply to this message.
  • OK - if you read my directions, the first part is heating the oil (just like you would in a frying pan on the stove). After removing the plate (which will be VERY hot) with the oil on it, you break the egg onto the plate - it will immediately start to cook (on the bottom side). You then need to break the yolk before microwaving it further (to cook the side facing up), because the yolk has a "skin" on it (which is why it stays separate from the white), and if you didn't break it, the skin would trap the steam in the yolk, and it would burst, causing a mess. A tent of paper should be used to contain any further splattering (from the oil, or anything else - remember, it is an egg being cooked).

    You are right - an unbroken egg in a microwave will cause an explosion - and a large mess. But if you notice, number 14 deals with frying an egg - not hard-boiling it (which I don't think is possible in a microwave - but it may be. Hey! New experiment!). I would imagine that if you placed an unbroken egg in a fire, you might have the same results. Perhaps if you poked a hole in the end of the egg, and sat it upright in a tray of salt?

    Your other experiments with microwave ovens (the grape and CD) are interesting. I have tried the CD one (to get rid of an MSN disk, made a coaster), but the grape one is new to me - I will have to try that.

    BTW - ever did the burning match plasma experiment?
  • Works for me... no more having to fsck around with directions involving "HIGH", "MEDIUM", or "LOW". These thresholds are NOT clearly defined... My microwave takes anything from 1-100 for the power. Every time I try to approximate something like that it comes out either destroyed from too much cooking or still frozen. I can't wait.
  • Makes me wonder how much stock the grocers are putting in the stats they're compiling.
  • OK, quick question for you and the previous poster(s). Do you people actually put correct info on your Safeway card form? I got one the first day they had their little temp person with a clipboard, and I've been using it ever since. Sure the tellers always call me "Mr. Smith" when they hand back my card, but I get the sale price, shop at the store I prefer, and still get the occassional 5% coupon.

  • Re:Will it decide what's best for me? (Score:4)

    by wnissen ( 59924 ) on Monday January 17, 2000 @07:04AM (#1365318)
    Okay, so that was a joke, but seriously, can't you see a net connected microwave reporting back to the manufacturer what kinds of foods you're eating? WebVan could buy ad space on your screen, trying to sell you a more expensive kind of the food you already eat. "Hmmm, she's eating cheap Marukan ramen, I wonder if we can get her to upgrade to Nissin cup o'noodles?"

    The bottom line is that more smart devices means more potential for abuse. Hell, thanks to the club cards, the store knows what I buy anyway, so they could track the food pattern back to the IP of my microwave...

    Walt
  • the senor in it automatically determines when it's done from the amount of steam comming off of the food.
    Sounds like the way I cook. If I'm cooking food on the stove and smoke starts coming out of it, I know it's done.
    --
  • Better hurry if you want Debian food. I don't suppose it would be as pleasant to stick your Woody in the microwave.
    --
  • dude, debian potato is frozen

  • well.... if the victim actually payed attention while their tv dinner was being rung up at the store, they would notice

    (i assume since there is an internet lookup for cooking instructions, they just run off the UPC code)
  • doh!

    i hate it when i miss things like that
  • Honey, can you order a new hard drive for our PC, I want to cook dinner?
  • I have wired a rice cooker, a toaster, and my coffee maker on X10 control. Between the 3 of these devices, you can get quite a bit of cooking done. Granted, you won't be eating like a king, but it sure beats a microwaved dinner.

    With a rice cooker, I wash the rice and load it in the night before. I compensate for the fact that the water's soaking the rice by using less water; and it works pretty well. With a toaster, I can load the bread in advance, pull it down, and power it on to toast. Rice cookers are great because they'll steam veggies (I'm a healthy geek), make marbled eggs, and cook certain meat dishes. I use my tea maker for tea and coffee, but if I get desperate, it works great for instant noodles too 8)

    All this is connected to my Linux box, using BottleRocket (on Freshmeat), so about an hour before I go back home I ssh in and issue away the commands. I can't wait till I can do this on my handspring visor, but until then dropping in to a public access terminal (I'm a college student) works.

    ... SiKnight

  • "Database and Food company sued for $1,000,000 as couch potatoe burns bits on microwave meal with incorrect internet cooking instructions."

    Or

    "Hackers hold cooking instructions for microwave popcorn to ransom."

    Also - Not to be a downer or anything - but this was reported on CNET and AP news about a year or so ago...


    C-))
  • "This new 'home appliance' evidently keeps track of the number of twinkies its owner consumes. Consumer innovation? Or geek profiling plot by the FBI?"
  • The purpose of grammer is to hold a standard in which to effectively communicate. In a sense, grammar can be compared to government. The main problem with the government(s) is that they do not and will not ever realize their true and only purpose for existence- defense- they are to defend society from outside force, and defend it from those inside doing harm. The purpose of grammer is to effectively communicate. I (and I believe almost all other english speaking readers of /. will agree with me) had absolutely no problem understanding the intent of his comment, and therefore his communication was effective and the purpose behind his grammer was fulfilled, so, his grammer was correct. Sorry, a bit off topic, but it is a pet peeve of mine.
    Language exists so that we can effectively communicate, not so that we will have more rules to follow.

  • Sounds like a good idea, but why use the Internet to download instructions based on the bar code?

    Why not just encode the recipe into the barcode itself?

    Seriously, how much data can the recipe consist of? High. 3 minutes.

    This would eliminate privacy concerns.

    - overflow
  • You must have a funky browser. As I get the article, the word Techserver links to http://www.techserver.com, and the word "reports" right after it links to http://www.techserver.com/noframes/story/0,2294,50 0155342-500192009-500825041-0,00.html. Two different links, right next to each other. Even passing my pointer over the two words (in IE 4.0) shows that they're different.
    --
  • You don't want Them to know where to find you, eating your Cap'n Crunch.
    In my case, I don't want them to have information about me without giving anything up. For instance, who are they giving my information to? How much money are they getting for it? What's their margin on this item?

    Sales of that information is quite a bit less benign than just the store having it. If your dental insurer finds out you eat a box of Cap'n Crunch every two days and you never buy toothpaste, they're bound to run your rates up. It would be one thing if they nagged you honestly and gave you a chance to change; it's quite another if you suddenly see a price increase and cannot connect it to anything you can change. These things give power to mega-business and take it away from the individual.
    --

  • You're absolutely right about that.

    Appliance companies are already looking toward selling services as much as (or instead of) goods. Electrolux is marketing a pay-per-load washing machine in Europe; they install it for free and you get the bill added to your utilities every month. The EU has data privacy laws, but in the USA (and Japan?) sales of very intimate customer data are possible just as soon as they become feasible to collect. Sales of the data would pay for the R&D and promotion. A scheme that doesn't lead to any data collection eliminates a profit center in the business.
    --

  • I think I used "Hubert Lewis Dewey". If I ever fill out another one of those (handy lock-openers, they're free, why not?) and it has a slot for "Employer", I'm going to put down "Dewey, Cheetham & Howe, Attys".
    --
  • Hell, thanks to the club cards, the store knows what I buy anyway
    They also have it if you pay by ATM card or check.

    I've stopped shopping at stores that have club cards (which means I have dumped my former-favorite supermarket).
    --

  • Click on the word "reports", it's a different URL.
    --
  • So why not just use the dodgy-details card when you have cash, and leave it in your pocket when you have to pay with a card/cheque?
    That still leaves you a loser in both situations.
    1. When you make a non-cash payment, you're losing your discounts and your anonymity.
    2. You can't take advantage of unexpected sales to stock up using the discount card (unless you carry a lot of cash).
    Personally I don't bother with reward cards at all
    I had one that I got for one sale at one store back in October (I'm still eating the results). I carried it until I had to pry back a bolt on a door... it made such a good emergency key I think I am going to get another one. ;-)

    I may make a practice of this. Those cards have to cost money. Having each one appear in the store's database once or twice and then never again makes it look like their shopper loyalty is reduced on top of their direct costs. It may make them more likely to terminate it.
    --

  • Great convenience, privacy nightmare (Score:3)

    by Tau Zero ( 75868 ) on Monday January 17, 2000 @07:19AM (#1365338) Journal
    If the Microwave showed a little bit of intelligence and took into account the wattage of the microwave when computing cooking time it could save a lot of guesswork when working with an unfamilar microwave or when cooking something you've never cooked before.
    And when the user keys in "45 sec" and gets something else, do you think they're not going to be confused/upset/ready to return the unit as defective?

    Sure, it takes a reasonably constant amount of energy to cook most microwave foods; cooking energy doesn't vary seriously until you have time variations which change the heat loss a lot. This suggests a rather simple workaround: print the cooking requirements in kilojoules, and let the user divide that by watts to get seconds. Okay, simple for geeks. The average person cannot even understand the difference between a kilowatt and a kilowatt-hour (and believe me, I've run into it); when their oven doesn't even list the wattage for the various power settings (and how many do?) they are going to be completely out of their depth. Even a geek would have trouble with that; imagine taking 5 minutes digging through the user manual so you can cook a 2-minute burrito. This is convenience? Here, gimme those two sticks, I think I can rub them together and make a fire (and my steak might just get done first).

    The advent of Internet-delivered cooking instructions is a privacy nightmare, of course. It's bad enough that the shopper-privacy-invasion card (or your ATM card, or your checking account number) keeps track of everything you buy, this would let Big Business see exactly when you ate it. But for the consumer who has so far had to guess at the translation from "3-5 minutes on medium" to the settings for their under-cupboard or full-size microwave, this is a godsend. The UPC code goes out, the packet that comes back encodes "Defrost requirements 9 KJ at 150 watts typical, cook requirements 60 KJ at 500 watts typical" and the oven can play it from there with power levels and duty cycles. No muss, no fuss. People will love it, and have no idea what they're revealing about themselves or what it will do to the rest of their lives. And that is a shame.
    --

  • Don't underestimate data-mining (Score:3)

    by Tau Zero ( 75868 ) on Monday January 17, 2000 @07:47AM (#1365339) Journal
    Why would anyone ever give real info anyway?
    If you ever give them real info (such as paying by check, ATM card or credit card) in the same transaction as you use your club card, you've just de-anonymized every club-card purchase you've ever made, and every one you ever make in the future. Doesn't that just make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside?

    Yet another reason why I'm a cash customer and make no apologies for it.
    --

  • you know, if they just printed on the package: "heat in your microwave on its highest setting for 4 seconds per watt of your microwave" or whatever was appropriate, and we were all smart enough to do a little arithmetic, we could leave the interent out of it completely (and we could do this all with current hardware.)
  • Excellent! Now all I need is a PRA (Personel Robotic Assistant). Then I won't ever have to get up from my console. I can order my tv dinners online from my favorite grocery e-tailor. My PRA will put them away, and if I ever want to eat something I can just issue a command and it will plop the correct meal in the nuker - voila! Does it get any better than this?
  • Ten(?) years ago, when I still used to eat hotdogs regularly, I would cook them in the microwave. Personally I liked mine just having plumped.

    My father however, would wait until they exploded, then load them with chili, cheese, onions, ketchup and mustard... (coronary on a plate)

    But I also had friend who used to like his hotdogs microwaved - very differently. He would microwave them until they were... crispy. I once had the distinct displeasure to witness this - and smell it as well.

    Yes folks, try it. Put a couple of small slits in a hotdog (to prevent it from exploding, put about two paper towels over it, set the power to full, and microwave it for TEN minutes... I garauntee you, what comes out appears to be completely inedible.

    My point is, different strokes for different folks. I like mine one way, my dad likes his another, and I make no explinations for my friend. What I'd like is something that not only selects the optimal time, but uses individual preferences to better construct the model...

    Not that I'd buy it anyway. I don't have a microwave, I don't use a microwave*.

    2 cents...

    * not completetly true: I do use the microwave at work to reheat last nights dinner for lunch.
  • I think someone mentioned this earlier, but what about having the instructions encoded *in* the barcode, rather than having it encode a url? This seems like it would be simpler, and avoid the privacy issue altogether.

    I vaguely remember some computer magazine a long time ago having programs that you could key into your computer, but also having the program encoded in a bar code, so you could just scan in the code. Where was that?

    Also, is any of this research with the Media Lab's Counter Intelligence project?
  • Just don't hit the magnetic strip too hard...
  • Barcode! Now that's what I call a short attention span.

    Just don't get it dirty...
  • And they can't even make a toaster oven that doesn't get impossibly hot on the outside. Please!
  • This suggests a rather simple workaround: print the cooking requirements in kilojoules, and let the user divide that by watts to get seconds. Okay, simple for geeks. They could print both time and energy requirements on the food. Then I would handprint a Joule scale on my minute scale. Of course if you a LCD display, you have to make a new PROM. Micro waves should be open source. Or maybe manufactores would start making microwaves so you can input energy requirement in Joule and it tells you cooking time in minutes.

  • Enhanced directions for the average American (Score:4)

    by CausticPuppy ( 82139 ) on Monday January 17, 2000 @07:46AM (#1365348)
    You are underestimating the stupidity of the average American. Otherwise, we wouldn't need instructions such as "heat and serve" on a can of soup. "Uhhh... how am I supposed to eat what's in this here metal can?"
    So, to add to your microwave cooking directions:
    6) When microwave dings, open the door and remove the food. It might be hot, because you have just been cooking it.
    7) Peel the plastic film off the tray. It might be hot, because you have just been cooking it.
    8) Insert a fork into the food in a scooping fashion. You might need to use the fork to break certain food items into smaller pieces first.
    9) Lift the fork towards your face, while making sure the food stays on the fork. Put the fork partially into your mouth, so that the food comes off of the fork and into your mouth. The food might be hot, because you have just been cooking it. Do not eat the fork. Do not stick the fork into your eye.
    10) Repeat steps 8 and 9 until there is no food left on the tray, or you are no longer hungry. WARNING: Attempting to continue eating when you are no longer hungry may result in vomiting.
  • What would work well is to use the UPC code to key a memory unit in the oven, to record the cook cycle that works best for you.

    press start
    enter time
    press beep (for the stir/turn)
    enter time
    enter time (repeat till done)
    press record
    wave box UPC in front of oven till it beeps.

    Next time you have that item, press "Auto cook" and wave the UPC code in front of the oven, which will then replay the same cooking sequence.

    You could store a customized cook cycle for every item you ever need to put in a microwave.
  • How about a FAT TAX. For every gram of fat listed on the box of the food you are going to consume a tax is taken to pay for the "impact on society" of you being a fat ass and the stress or potential stress you will place on our health system.

    I sincerely hope that you're joking. Certainly a low-fat diet* works for some people, but eating low-fat makes me and many others gain unwanted weight. Why? Because eating low-fat means eating a high-carbyhydrate diet. Carbohydrates are empty calories, completely devoid of nutrition, and also cause a hunger reaction. This causes us to eat more -- and if we don't know any better, we'll eat more carbohydrates because they're low-fat. And we eat more, and more, and even the most clueless can see why we continue to gain weight. If we eat food that is high in protein, low in carbohydrates, and never mind the fat, we will be full quickly, therefore eat less and lose (or maintain) weight.

    * A diet is a way of eating, not a temporary restriction on what one can eat.

    What's my point? Not everyone has the same metabolism and body type. What helps you keep in shape does not necessarily make me keep in shape. (ObConspiracy: Remember that the cereal companies are powerful. Remember, too, that eggs were found to be dangerously high in cholesterol, when they aren't, in studies sponsered by the cereal companies.) If you tax fat consumption, I will either go broke or gain unhealthy, unwanted weight. Unless even the most paranoid conspiracy theorist of us is mistaken, that is not the intent of those who cry "tax fat consumption" and "make the fat pay for their own health care".

    Sorry for the off-topic rant. I'm tired of being told what to eat to lose weight and gain health, because I'm overweight and unhealthy precisely because I listened to that advice in the past. If any of this strikes a chord with you, check your library for books by Dr. Robert Atkins and the Drs. Heller, among others. Remember, though, my point: not everyone has the same body, so make sure you eat a diet that works for you.

  • Now this takes out all the guesses of microwaving things that don't come with microwave instructions: forks, spoons, AOL CD's, and small rodents.

  • Maytag and Microsoft (Score:3)

    by richj ( 85270 ) on Monday January 17, 2000 @11:05AM (#1365352)
    I just saw a little clip the other night on TV how Microsoft and Maytag are teaming up to make "smart appliances", though I can't seem to find any mention of it on the Web anywhere.

    How long before the script kiddies are able to freeze over my produce drawer and defrost my freezer?

    # kitchen_killa -t xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx
    -> connecting to oven
    -> turning on burners
    -> connecting to fridge
    -> programming icemaker (infinite l00p)
    -> done!
    -> gr33tz out to Babba Booey and the former h4ck3rz at KitchenAid.
  • I really had to laugh when I read this article.
    When the idea of affordable (read:free) access to the net became an idea, many people turned to us sysadmins asking "well, what can we do with internetworking"?.

    To convey the idea that the internet would as common as refrigorator, most people used the "your toaster can tell your phone when to order more bread", or, "The capuchino maker can tell you fridge you need more milk." These examples were used much in the same way foo-bar is used to describe a variable (i.e.:"Once domain foo.and domain bar are linked, you'll have a "foo-bar link"). When using this little phrase, we don't expect the customer to actually register foo.com and bar.com and link them, they're just examples!

    Now here, we have an appliance company (uppon hearing that TTML was the wave of the future (toaster to toaster markup language) actually puts research into the effort.

    It's funny, laugh!
    _________________________

  • the mother of necessity.

    ;)
    _________________________

  • Lack of vision (Score:3)

    by mOdQuArK! ( 87332 ) on Monday January 17, 2000 @11:18AM (#1365355)
    These penny-ante little functionality upgrades are BOOOORING! The proper cooking profile for a meal should be coded ONTO THE MEAL PACKAGE, where it can be read & followed by the microwave.

    In short, I want the microwave to have two buttons - Start and Stop - and THAT'S ALL! I just want to buy the damn package w/a funky encoded label, put it in the box, push the Start button, the microwave reads the label & knows exactly what it's supposed to do to cook that particular meal.

    (Microwaves might also have some atmospheric-condition sensors like barometer & humidity, which can be used to modify the cooking profile for local conditions).

    Of course, you'd have to come up w/some kind of standard for the label encoding, and the microwaves would have to be able to read it (ala a cheap version of the laser readers @ the checkout counters?).

    I wonder if you could deal with "normal" (non-packaged) food by having some way of detecting how the microwaves are interacting w/the food (reflect/scatter characteristics?) and to modify the transmission. For instance, if you detect that the food is about to explode because it's absorbing too much energy too fast, the microwave should probably cut back the power a bit.

  • Re:Lack of metal in your microwave (Score:3)

    by mOdQuArK! ( 87332 ) on Monday January 17, 2000 @02:11PM (#1365356)
    Why would the package have to be metal?

    You can encode the data as fine-grained barcode, or perhaps one of those 2D bar codes. Hell, if you want to get funky, you could encode the data into the picture on the box and the microwave could use a CCD camera & decryption software to get it out. Or, you could outfit the package with a circuit which transmits the data via LED or radio-link when it is _powered_ by microwaves! (damn, my creative juices are flowing good right now :)

    Let's take that a little farther - you could use the microwaves to power little mechanical stirrers in the package to help distribute the heat around for proper all through cooking. You could deliberately create metal strips in the package which deliver radiant heat from the microwave energy to the right places in the package to facilitate browning of your food (I believe they already do something like this for those "hot pocket" thingies).

    Perhaps you could even make the package do animated displays powered by the microwaves!

    "Hey, who are you guys? What's the straightjacket...wait a minute, don't you dare put that on ME!"

    P.S. Does anybody have any guesses/knowledge whether the "harmful" effects (to the magnetron, I assume) of metal in a microwave apply if you have a circuit which is designed properly to accept & use the microwave energy?
  • Most drinks are like that, anyway. Orange soda is almost nothing like oranges, etc.


    -----
  • I wouldn't worry as much about someone turning off someone's fridge. I would worry about someone cracking the database on the company's web server and changing all the cooking times around. Making the microwave think that popcorn needs to be on high for 50 minutes rather than 5.
    -

  • This won't last... (Score:5)

    by MattMann ( 102516 ) on Monday January 17, 2000 @07:01AM (#1365365)
    This will never last. Everybody knows in the future our best computers will still not have solved all the problems of natural language recognition, and we will have to ask for our foods backwards: computer, tea, Earl Grey, hot.

    Attempts to keep track of preferences between sessions all fail in the food realm because for most meals people reject cookies.

  • Privacy considerations,

    How can this afflict the privacy of the homeowner. I can imagine a lots of ways this can be abused by corporations.

    Security considerations,
    Do we really need to have everything connected to the net, what if a hacker disconnects/turns on the refrigerator/microwave while the owner is on vacation.

    (it doesnt imply its connected to the net yet i feel its relevant)
  • I'll be impressed if it's able to heat it EVENLY. I've given up on the whole microwave dinner thing due to the fact that it's more work than cooking a real meal to get the whole thing hot, and not burned. Ugh. Half burnt, half cold microwave lasagna. Ugh.
  • So here we have something else to take a little of the brainwork out of living. It does sound like a good idea, since I'm one of those cooking-impaired people (still can't even make french toast). However, if you subscribe to the oft-mentioned Star Trek philosophy, all this convenience is supposed to be freeing the human race up to pursue other intellectual and physical pursuits like exploration and research. So, why is it with all this we're getting more stressed and more violent every day???

    Something to think about...

  • you've just de-anonymized every club-card purchase you've ever made, and every one you ever make in the future.

    Oh deary dear ... someone out there knows I wear size nine shoes, eat broccoli, and once bought a Hallmark card that said "Get well soon, or I'll stomp you in da head!"

    Mine my data all you want folks. All you're going to end up with is a sh*tload of info worth exactly that, a sh*tload. All these companies are wasting their time with this stuff. They are going to stockpile all this data and then figure out that it's absolutely worthless. Haven't they ever heard of the central limit theorem?

    Of course, if you're purchasing patterns are putting up flags in some database in some bureau, you'll want to stick with cash. But you already know that.

    If you're that paranoid, consider moving to the third world. They'll need a spy satellite to track you down.

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