Google Explains Why It's All In On Matter, the First True Smart Home Standard (theverge.com) 66
Matter is a new open-source, interoperability smart home standard that's been created by over 200 companies to allow all of your devices to communicate with each other locally, without the need for a cloud. The Verge sat down with Michele Turner, the senior director of Google Smart Home Ecosystem, to hear how the company plans to implement Matter when it finally arrives later this year. Here's an excerpt from the interview: Matter has evolved substantially from that first meeting, and there have been delays and setbacks. Do you still feel confident in that original vision, that it's being carried through and is on track to achieve what you set out to do at that Woodside dinner three years ago?
Michele Turner: I do. And, in fact, I think it's exceeding our original vision in some ways. It's been incredibly heartening to see the enthusiasm and the adoption and the number of companies that have joined the CSA and the Matter workgroup. We're at 200 companies -- it's amazing.
How is Matter going to change the smart home experience for the Google Home user?
Michele Turner: "For the Google Home user, I think the bigger areas of Matter where they'll see change first is in getting your devices set up. I just set up some lights at my mother-in-law's house, and it still took me 45 minutes to set up four lights. It shouldn't have been so hard. The first thing is going to be that significantly simpler setup. The second piece is the speed and the reliability of the local network. This has been a big pain point for users. My team spent a lot of time working with partners on improving reliability and reducing latency. Because in our mind, if it's not as fast as a light switch, what's the point? We believe Matter's going to drive down those latency numbers significantly and improve the overall reliability of devices in the home. Then, I think interoperability for users is going to be a big piece. As much as we love having everybody using the Google Assistant, the reality is people have iPhones and Android phones in their homes. Some of them want to use HomeKit. We just don't have that kind of compatibility today for users. And I think that's hard. Being able to have multi-admin really work well between these ecosystems is going to be a big benefit for users.
Then, our long-term goal is to build out what we call the proactive home. Instead of having a whole bunch of connected devices, how do we build that truly proactive home that works for the benefit of users? ... Matter is going to be absolutely foundational to that. It's the architecture behind the proactive home. If we don't have a home that's reliable, if we don't have things running locally, if it doesn't work consistently, we cannot deliver on that promise. The proactive home is really that intelligence layer, whether it's being able to predict that I'm going upstairs, it's 10 at night, and I always go into my bedroom at that time, so turn on the lights for me; or, I'm watching TV, it's 9:30PM, the kids are in bed, and I get a notification on my phone that the lights just went on in the kid's bedroom. Is somebody sick? Are they watching YouTube? Being able to do anomaly detection. Now, Matter doesn't do that. But it's foundational to be able to enable the rest of that. Because if that core foundation of the home -- of the smart home -- isn't solid, the rest of it just doesn't work."
As you've said, Matter is complicated. And there's a lot of expectation that's been placed on its shoulders. What would you say is the biggest misconception right now with Matter?
Michele Turner: "I think the biggest misconception is that Matter is going to solve every problem in IoT. It doesn't have a native intelligence layer that's going to automatically give you the proactive home. In my mind, it's solving three very foundational things. It's solving making setup easier for the majority of the devices that people put in their homes. Not the majority of device types, necessarily, but the majority of devices people put in their homes. It's making the IoT more reliable and faster. And then it's going to solve this multi-admin problem. It's going to provide that device interconnectivity that we don't have today that is really great for users. While it's going to be a lot more than that, it's not today. But it's solving what we believe are really the core problems that have challenged adoption by mainstream users in the past." The report notes that all of Google's existing Nest branded smart speakers and displays will be upgraded to support Matter, "allowing you to use Google's voice assistant to control any Matter-enabled device in your home, no matter who made it."
Michele Turner: I do. And, in fact, I think it's exceeding our original vision in some ways. It's been incredibly heartening to see the enthusiasm and the adoption and the number of companies that have joined the CSA and the Matter workgroup. We're at 200 companies -- it's amazing.
How is Matter going to change the smart home experience for the Google Home user?
Michele Turner: "For the Google Home user, I think the bigger areas of Matter where they'll see change first is in getting your devices set up. I just set up some lights at my mother-in-law's house, and it still took me 45 minutes to set up four lights. It shouldn't have been so hard. The first thing is going to be that significantly simpler setup. The second piece is the speed and the reliability of the local network. This has been a big pain point for users. My team spent a lot of time working with partners on improving reliability and reducing latency. Because in our mind, if it's not as fast as a light switch, what's the point? We believe Matter's going to drive down those latency numbers significantly and improve the overall reliability of devices in the home. Then, I think interoperability for users is going to be a big piece. As much as we love having everybody using the Google Assistant, the reality is people have iPhones and Android phones in their homes. Some of them want to use HomeKit. We just don't have that kind of compatibility today for users. And I think that's hard. Being able to have multi-admin really work well between these ecosystems is going to be a big benefit for users.
Then, our long-term goal is to build out what we call the proactive home. Instead of having a whole bunch of connected devices, how do we build that truly proactive home that works for the benefit of users? ... Matter is going to be absolutely foundational to that. It's the architecture behind the proactive home. If we don't have a home that's reliable, if we don't have things running locally, if it doesn't work consistently, we cannot deliver on that promise. The proactive home is really that intelligence layer, whether it's being able to predict that I'm going upstairs, it's 10 at night, and I always go into my bedroom at that time, so turn on the lights for me; or, I'm watching TV, it's 9:30PM, the kids are in bed, and I get a notification on my phone that the lights just went on in the kid's bedroom. Is somebody sick? Are they watching YouTube? Being able to do anomaly detection. Now, Matter doesn't do that. But it's foundational to be able to enable the rest of that. Because if that core foundation of the home -- of the smart home -- isn't solid, the rest of it just doesn't work."
As you've said, Matter is complicated. And there's a lot of expectation that's been placed on its shoulders. What would you say is the biggest misconception right now with Matter?
Michele Turner: "I think the biggest misconception is that Matter is going to solve every problem in IoT. It doesn't have a native intelligence layer that's going to automatically give you the proactive home. In my mind, it's solving three very foundational things. It's solving making setup easier for the majority of the devices that people put in their homes. Not the majority of device types, necessarily, but the majority of devices people put in their homes. It's making the IoT more reliable and faster. And then it's going to solve this multi-admin problem. It's going to provide that device interconnectivity that we don't have today that is really great for users. While it's going to be a lot more than that, it's not today. But it's solving what we believe are really the core problems that have challenged adoption by mainstream users in the past." The report notes that all of Google's existing Nest branded smart speakers and displays will be upgraded to support Matter, "allowing you to use Google's voice assistant to control any Matter-enabled device in your home, no matter who made it."
... and privacy? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:... and privacy? (Score:5, Funny)
You'll get two special modes of operation. Incognito Mode - to conceal your cooking disasters, and Wanking Mode - for the cyber naughty. There'll be a clause in the EULA saying that the footage won't be sold to 3rd parties but Google may still use it as the source of novelty porn for their employees.
Re:... and privacy? (Score:5, Interesting)
I noticed that also, and the repeated use of that phrase "IoT" when what we really need and want (if we are savvy) is LNOT - local network of things - undercuts that claim. I am suspicious having has to return a couple of devices and delete apps that it turned out required you to always be able to "phone home" to a remote server that you do not control for it to work, which was not mentioned in the promotional materials.
The articles reference to using "predictive analytics" set my teeth on edge since that invariably means uploading your data to a remote data center for someone's data mining system to work on.
Re:... and privacy? (Score:5, Informative)
what we really need and want (if we are savvy) is LNOT - local network of things
Which is exactly what Matter is: it's an application-layer IP protocol that can sit on-top of various local transport layers (WiFi, Ethernet, Bluetooth) and allows otherwise unrelated devices to talk directly to each other, which potentially allows for e.g. an Apple speaker to control a Google (or generic) thermostat, without requiring any special Google-specific protocol support. So far, this doesn't exist. Every smart home system uses their own, largely unique, application layer, which means a smart-home hub needs to specifically and explicitly support that protocol (or talk to something that does), or they can't work together.
Now, after that, nothing prevents any of these smart devices from communicating with the Internet (or not), but that is up to the manufacturer: the protocol supports it, but doesn't require it. With a protocol like this, it should actually be a lot easier to make privacy-conscious devices: in theory you could roll your own on a Raspberry Pi with a microphone and speaker. The devices you buy can still snitch on you, but we might finally be able to be free from needing a central controller that does so.
Re: (Score:2)
The other nice improvement is that you are able to set up devices without installing a manufacturer specific app. At the moment you usually need a special app to do the initial configuration at the very least.
The standard is open, there is a repo on Github with documentation and sample code. Open source support is already happening on platforms like Home Assistant and ESP32.
Re: (Score:2)
That's the issue with Matter. It destroys the privacy protections that were built into standards such as Zigbee. There was a reason Zigbee devices couldn't connect to the internet autonomously. Google is cleverly removing those barriers in the name of interoperability.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Personally, I don't care so much if somebody can tell when I turn lights on or off; ...
I do care about this. If someone notices that I am not switching them on & off then they might rightly deduce that I am away on holiday and tell their mate Burglar Bill. For similar reasons I do not want a smart electricity meter as it uploads my power usage every hour.
Anti-Matter (Score:4, Funny)
After the tiny teaser, "without the cloud", there's not a single mention of how privacy might improve in that whole quote.
To get privacy you'll need to connect an Anti-Matter device. It's guaranteed to defeat any data transmission from your house or indeed any other house within a 50 km radius using its own mushroom-shaped cloud technology.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:3)
After the tiny teaser, "without the cloud", there's not a single mention of how privacy might improve in that whole quote.
You have to read between the lines and make educated guesses based on past performance. I can well believe that the task-critical data communications will all take place locally, both because it reduces latencies and because it decreases the load on the cloud servers.
That said, I don't believe for a moment that these systems - even ones configured not to use Alexa, Siri, or some other spy - will operate properly without an Internet connection. As you (rightly) implied, there is no way in hell the folks who
Re: (Score:2)
Surveillance capitalism (Score:5, Insightful)
Regrettably, if Google is all-in on a protocol or technology, it will increase their ability to surveil the user or increase their dominance on the Web (e.g. Amp).
Now, don't get me wrong, they provide fabulous services if we're willing to silently get the information proctosigmoidoscopy, and I've made that bargain with them. For business, their G Suite, or whatever it's branded as nowadays, is incredible. But they also bring the surveillance capitalism angle and the proprietary dominance model too.
Re: (Score:2)
Matter is designed to work without any cloud services or internet conenctivity:
https://matter-smarthome.de/en... [matter-smarthome.de]
You would be wise to firewall all your smart devices onto a separate network that doesn't have internet access.
Re: (Score:2)
They've got to be "all in" for this sort of thing, or else there's really no use for any of their products.
Right now, if you want a voice assistant that does everything you want, you buy an Alexa. You could buy a Google Home, but it probably won't work with $something because Google can't be bothered to support it, or because the third party developers don't have a Google Home to develop with. If there was some magical all-singing, all-dancing way to interoperate, then suddenly a Google Home wouldn't be a p
long as they do cloudless. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
>"I don't want anything from google either. however their support of a standard can make an ecosystem thrive."
Or it can absolutely destroy an ecosystem, like web browsers. Just saying.
Re: (Score:1)
Re:long as they do cloudless. (Score:4, Informative)
Depending how DIY you want to get, look for devices that can run the Tasmota firmware: https://tasmota.github.io/docs... [github.io]
There is even at least one ali express seller I'm aware of, called Athom (https://athom.aliexpress.com/store/5790427) that openly advertises being Tasmota friendly and they have edison and gu 10 RGBWWCW lights.
Then use Home Assistant (https://www.home-assistant.io/) for an actual mobile and web app.
Use a cheap raspberry pi to run the mqtt and home assistant servers and there you go. You are cloudless, behind a firewall, and in control.
Re: (Score:3)
I want to be able to run this off a Raspberry Pi that I own.
Google Project (Score:4, Insightful)
of course they are (Score:3, Interesting)
"Matter ...has been created by over 200 companies to allow all of your devices to communicate with ..." their remote corporate masters to allow them to collect data to monetize ever-more intimate parts of peoples' lives.
Is that about right?
Re:of course they are (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: of course they are (Score:4, Informative)
Appleâ(TM)s HomeKit will work without cloud integration. Sure it heads out by way of one of the gateways if you want it, but it will work locally without any internet connection. This has been one of the challenges for adding certain devices s as they need a more complete software stack as they canâ(TM)t rely on their cloud masters to work.
Competing standards (Score:2)
If a competing standard appears, say "AntiMatter", can they not then join forces and blow up the whole idea?
Thanks, but no thanks. (Score:2)
The saying "For a man's house is his castle" says it all. Your home is supposed to be private, reliable, rock-solid shelter, operational and safe at all times. Smart homes are the complete opposite.
That's the point of cloudless - offline use (Score:2)
The saying "For a man's house is his castle" says it all. Your home is supposed to be private, reliable, rock-solid shelter, operational and safe at all times. Smart homes are the complete opposite.
Matter's cloudless feature means you can control your lights, even if you have no internet.
Also, no home in history has ever been "private, reliable, rock-solid shelter, operational and safe at all times." Anything that works has the potential to stop working: electricity, running water, even the roof.
Matter is a step in the right direction. I think these organizations are treating smart homes like less of a novelty and more of a serious endeavor. It needs to be supported after a vendor loses inter
Re: (Score:3)
The problem here is not cloud vs cloudless. It's making the fundamental mechanism in your home (heating, security, etc) demendent on software and electricity. Good luck trying to stay warm or even have running water (if it's somehow connected to the Smart Home stack) in case of a blackout, or when an update goes wrong. Plus, by using any kind of software to run your home your shelter inherits all the security and reliability issues that come with it.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
We burned that bridge 5 decades ago when central heating systems came in (with their dependence on pumps to move the heat around).
Re: (Score:2)
Most people already have an electronic thermostat controlling their heating. If the power goes out they can press the manual override button, assuming that the boiler itself doesn't need electricity to work, and most modern ones do.
I've contributed to this standard (Score:5, Interesting)
Amazon made a big push for zigbee and if devices conform to Amazon's enhanced version (WWAHubs or what ever it is called). If you make IoT devices this is the way to do it. Not just to work with Alexa but any other competent company's devices (so not Samsung's SmartThings or its clones).
Either Zigbee* or Matter will be the application layer for all IoT devices soon or the zigbee alliance will kill them both. My bet is on the later. Oh, the zigbee alliance also absorbed z-wave so that has no hope.
*it was called the zigbee cluster library, then dot-dot, then it has started to morph into Matter. Originally it was binary at the session layer, which is very easy for embedded devices to parse and easy(ish) to securely parse. Except all the web people like text with all it's escape and special characters. The money is in owning the IoT data so the cloud people always seem to have more money so they tend to win the arguments at the standards meetings and then wonder why device makers to embrace the new standard.
Was not aware of Matter's existance (Score:2)
I have been looking around occasionally for IoT connection protocols that are free and open.
Am not too concerned if Google will suddenly quit this thing (as is their track record), as there are many other companies involved, especially big ones (article mentions Amazon, Apple, Samsung, Philips, etc as well)..
If it really does not need a cloud / internet connection, I am very tempted to have a good look at this. Now lets see if I can run a controller hub on my home Synology NAS, which already runs 24/7 and h
No Cloud Required, No Vendor Lockin (Score:5, Informative)
My understanding is that Matter is essentially like Zigbee, only it's an open standard. So all the devices communicate wirelessly to some hub (of any brand) that then controls them. Google hopes this hub will be one of their Google Nest Home devices, just as Amazon hopes it will be one of their Echo devices. But it could just as easily be a Raspberry Pi with a Matter radio running open source software. That will probably be a little slower to become available. (I would love to see that with open source voice recognition.)
This also means no vendor lock-in. Your Matter devices shouldn't need to talk to your vendor's servers, so your vendor can go bankrupt without bricking your devices.
But for most people, all their devices will be controlled by the same Matter hub, regardless of vendor. Google is hoping most people will use their devices, which is why they're all-in on it. I expect they're probably right.
Apple supports as well (Score:3, Informative)
My understanding is that Matter is essentially like Zigbee, only it's an open standard.
Don't know the details of Matter myself but that does seem to be the case, since Apple is supporting Matter [apple.com] also...
Maybe now I can get a functional HomeKit security camera?
Hopefully an AppleTV can act as a Matter hub, and I can get the same level of privacy with Matter devices I am used to with HomeKit.
Re: (Score:2)
Hopefully an AppleTV can act as a Matter hub, and I can get the same level of privacy with Matter devices I am used to with HomeKit.
Matter doesn't have hubs, at least not in the sense that you mean. It's just a communication protocol between devices. Thread is the new technology that acts as an IoT-focused, local, self-healing, low power, low latency, mesh network alternative to WiFi and Bluetooth. There are Thread Border Routers that act as bridges between your local Thread mesh network and the LAN or WAN, and, in fact, the latest 4K Apple TV is already one such Thread Border Router, as is the HomePod Mini.
Think of it this way:
* Thread
Re: (Score:2)
The trick there is that even if a smart home kit supports Matter, it doesn't mean the individual devices do. Fo
Re: (Score:2)
Thanks for clearing up where I was a bit off.
The point about Matter kits should be just a transition phase while they sell of their legacy inventory. Within a few years, I would expect all individual smart devices to support Matter directly without some intermediary translation. I could be wrong, but I think there's enough market force behind Matter to make it hard to stay in the market without supporting it fully.
There will still be the problem of dealing with any legacy smart devices you own that can't
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Absolutely true.
I've done the smart devices that actually solve a problem. I have a smart switch to turn on my front lights at sunset and off again around bedtime. I have smart plugs to program the holiday lights. Those are all WiFi to avoid a hub. I bought a security camera that will write to my local file server, so there's no cloud component (I ran ethernet for it).
Cue Google Graveyard in 7 years (Score:3)
Other concerns:
* Privacy
* Security
* Energy vampire cost
Smart homes have been tried for the past 10 years. "This" time it will be different, right? /s
Re: Cue Google Graveyard in 7 years (Score:2)
7 years ? That's being generous.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, I was debating between 5 and 7 years. Since there are apparently 200+ companies I gave it another 2 years before Google abandons it.
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, I suppose it's already been many years and no hardware product has shipped yet. It needs to be given at least 6 months in the marketplace before it can be killed.
When it comes to energy vampire cost, smarthome can actually be used to reduce that, if it is your singular focus. And for me, it has been.
I'm using Home Assistant on a Raspberry Pi3, and $15 TP-Link KP125 energy monitoring smartplugs to that effect. The smartplugs monitor devices and turn devices on/off as needed.
For example, when I put my de
I'll believe it when I see it (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Exactly ! And most of those hardware products never get updates.
I'm still waiting for my 15 Chromecast Audios to get proper gapless support. At least these were cheap. Expectations were low.
In my home theater, almost all the sources (HTPC excepted) and the receiver support CEC. But the display, which is a projector, does not. That makes CEC not work at all, unfortunately. So, I'm using a mixture a programmable IR remote, an ARRX18G, with open-source software, called RemoteMaster, to program the remote. I us
The name is inspired, as usual. "Matter"! (Score:2)
The product names chosen by Google are always unique, so you could never confuse them with anything else, and can easily search for them on the internet. Names such as "Home", "Pixel", and "Matter" have never been used before and clearly identify Google products.
As a major search engine company, they are very clearly aware of the value of choosing names carefully.
Re: (Score:1)
Won't be a problem; as long as you use their search engine, their products will appear before any other uses of the words...
"Google" "All In" (Score:2)
One of these things is not like the other.
Open Source (Score:5, Insightful)
>"Matter is a new open-source, interoperability smart home standard"
Yes and no:
"Matter, formerly Project Connected Home over IP (CHIP), is a proprietary, royalty-free home automation connectivity standard."
"Although the Matter code repository is open-source under the Apache license, the Matter specification is licensed by CSA."
Stress on the words "proprietary" and "licensed"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Re:Open Source (Score:4, Informative)
What it means is that you can't put the Matter logo on your product unless you licence it and complete their interoperability tests. Basically the same as USB.
Looking at USB, there are a huge number of open source implementations. They often use unofficial ID codes and aren't put through the whole suite of tests needed to get certified, but they work just fine and and describe themselves as being USB compatible. The USB licencing org doesn't do anything to disrupt them.
All in ? (Score:2)
Unfortunate click-bait headline
All-in :
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/all-in
Quote: in a way that shows a lot of determination and a willingness to take a big risk in order to achieve something:
example: rather than take the safer path and keep his day job, Merkley went all in and quit his executive post.
This is not even close to applying to Google. The only thing Google is "all-in" is its ad business. This "Matters" initiative could fail miserably and be cancelled tomorrow, and most o
Sounds great... But. (Score:2)
The smartest home is a heterogenous one (Score:2)
Even if you are talking about a new construction home, it's extremely unlikely that you are going to ever get all home devices/appliances working with a common smarthome hardware communication standard. Think HVAC, doorbell, wall oven, cooktop, toaster, microwave oven, clothes washer, dryer, dishwasher, TV, speakers, audio receiver, video streamer, garage door opener, refrigerator, freezer, wine cooler, projector, robot vacuum, automated cat litterbox, security system, electric bidet seat, humidifier, etc.
Déjà vu ? (Score:2)
No ? Not again ? [xkcd.com]
Google Nest Protect (Score:2)
I'll celebrate Matter when I can actually interact with Google Nest Protect smoke/fire detectors from home assistant. They have both a temperature sensor and a motion sensor included, so they would work very well in giving additional input to a smart home for things like presence-detection.
Battery is an issue you say? Well, they have a wired AC model that would solve that.
NO to Smart house (Score:1)