From The Verge.

This week on The Vergecast, the co-founder and former CEO of iRobot, Colin Angle, joins The Verge’s smart home reviewer, Jennifer Pattison Tuohy, to discuss what the ideal home robot is. Are we close to creating a Rosie the Robot — an all-in-one humanoid robot that can take care of our homes, or should we take an entirely different approach to home robotics? They dive into the advances in technology powering this shift and ponder what purpose robotics in the home should really serve.

Then, Jen takes a journey back into smart home history to help us understand its future. Grant Erickson, Principal of Nuovations, a former Apple, Nest, and Google engineer who was part of the team that developed Thread, joins the show.

He shares the story of how and why, back in 2011, the Nest team, led by Tony Faddell and Matt Rogers, decided to create a smart home protocol. It involves a thermostat, fragmented ecosystems, and one of the best smart home products ever made.

They discuss how Thread became the foundation of the Matter smart home standard — an unprecedented industry collaboration with a herculean task — to make the smart home simpler.

To close out the show, Grant sticks around to help answer a Vergecast hotline question about how Matter manages your data.

Further reading: https://www.theverge.com/e/759695

00:00 – Intro
00:28 – Remember Rosie the robot?
03:35 – Interview: Colin Angle, iRobot Co-Founder
06:56 – What is a robot?
12:23 – Generative AI’s impact on robotics
25:05 – Rosie vs. Starship Enterprise
32:04 – Robot arms, legs, and utility
35:08 – Human connection with robots
39:00 – Smart home protocols: Matter and Thread
41:00 – Interview: Grant Erickson on Thread
44:00 – The development of Thread
48:00 – Matter and the industry collaboration
52:00 – Thread, hubs, and Smart home infrastructure
56:00 – The future of Thread
59:00 – Data privacy in the smart home
1:01:00 – Closing remarks & credits

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