Secrets Revealed: Big Blue Had a Blue (Tooth) Idea 20 years ago… and blew it!

By Richard M. Sherwin

About twenty years ago I was working for IBM when I got called into a very secret meeting. Even though I was an executive there, each one of us who entered what was called the Skunk Room (a hidden research lab), had to go through a detector to make sure we didn’t have a recording device or camera. A few very high level reporters were also in attendance and they had to sign non disclosures that prohibited them from writing about this secret project until permitted to do so by IBM’s CEO.

Once we entered this simulated three bedroom apartment, that was about 1750 square feet, there didn’t seem to be anything special about it. But only five feet into the apartment, (which looked right out of a 1990s Good Housekeeping middle America design),  things changed right before our eyes and ears.

The porch light went on with a soft yet comforting light and you couldn’t see where it came from. Windham Hill (relaxation music) came gently from hidden speakers, and the volume automatically adjusted… when you spoke the volume lowered and when you stopped talking it gently raised a few decibels.

Then a soft voice asked us how we wanted our coffee or tea and did we want fruit and Danish to eat. Since most of us were either technical experts or consumer product specialists, we just thought it was another of IBM’s robots running the demonstration.

The refrigerator had a built in screen (like the ones that are only now appearing in new high end appliances) and it clearly indicated what food was inside, what portions were left and what was going to expire.

Various sized IBM computers, including (at the time) the breathtakingly cool Stealth Desktop model and the not yet available to the public IBM Thinkpads. And tablet sized 10 inch screens were discreetly placed on every surface. These PCs and laptops seemed to be created and molded to fit into every piece of furniture and space.

Because it was Super Bowl time of year several of us chatted while the not so robotic voice took orders for our snacks.

The minute we started talking to each other, we argued about the commercials that might be appearing on the Super Bowl. All of a sudden, in the living room portion of the experimental house, a large TV opened up from an armoire. And right away, super bowl commercial highlights began playing on the TV…again with hidden audio.

The best part of this demo was not the almost scary automation of what our voices were causing…  TVs opening up to content, audio and lights changing through voice modulation… it was that when we looked closer (or tried to find hidden products) like home theater audio systems, high definition TVs or hidden speakers, nothing was attached to wires except the refrigerator.

Not to be sexist, but the women executives and reporters realized this new bastion of neatness and lack of clutter before the guys did, but all the attendees were astounded that almost everything in the place was clean, neat, wireless and unbelievably automated.

Push ahead to 2013, everything that was demonstrated in the “skunk works” at IBM is now a reality. Refrigerators have smart computer screens to manage and monitor your food. Discreetly placed speakers can automatically raise or lower the volume of your music and attach wirelessly to their home theater central location via Blue Tooth. Smart TVs can accurately guess what you might want to be watching on your giant flat screen.

Different sized and different capability computers ranging from 4 inch Smart phones to 8 or 10 inch Tablet Computers to versatile Laptops that convert to Tablets and Tablets that convert to desktops themselves can be tied to home network wirelessly via WIFI.

And if done correctly this is all using 70% less wires than usually clutters your home.

Too bad IBM dumped this ideal home and pretty much gave it away to a number of companies that took nearly two decades to do what Big Blue did then.

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