Smart Beds Helped Them Sleep on a Cloud. Then the Cloud Crashed

22 pointsposted 3 months ago
by Animats
(nytimes.com)

13 Comments

Youden

3 months ago

The architecture of Eight Sleep is that the "Pod" – despite having a full Linux system running – is treated as nothing but a sensor and actuator. Absolutely zero decision-making happens on the device itself; it's all controlled by commands received from the mothership via an AWS service.

My cynical take has always been that this is their justification for charging a subscription fee for features that shouldn't require one (e.g. an alarm clock or the ability to change the temperature on a schedule).

There are a couple of open-source projects around jailbreaking it:

- Probably the original attempt: https://github.com/bobobo1618/ninesleep

- The much more polished and usable application built from that starting point: https://github.com/throwaway31265/free-sleep

The latter is even able to do the signal processing needed for heart rate on-device.

pedalpete

3 months ago

I found this to be a very strange architectural decision.

We work in the neurotech/sleeptech space (https://affectablesleep.com) and have a subscription service as well. We know when your subscription runs out, and have built the device to run completely offline, and even have a buffer of days if it can't connect to check you have a valid subscription.

Say what you will about subscription services, but being actively hostile to your user base because the device can't connect to a service on one night, seems like very poor planning.

I actually quite look up to 8Sleep as one of the better companies in this space, so I'm surprised this happened to them.

buggeryorkshire

3 months ago

"have a buffer of days"

Interesting. So if your product cannot connect to the cloud/subscription, but still works, why is there an issue with it working fully locally?

pedalpete

3 months ago

Yes, our product works without any internet connection. I'm not sure what you mean "why is there an issue"?

I don't think we have an issue, 8Sleep had an issue.

1shooner

3 months ago

>“I still plan to continue to use it,” he said. “The main friction point is, really, the mattress should work even without Wi-Fi.”

I appreciate the drifting semantics of names, but Wi-Fi and AWS are really not the same thing.

HPsquared

3 months ago

No WiFi, no AWS (as far as the mattress is concerned). "Works without WiFi" would be sufficient but not necessary for functioning through the AWS outage.

omnicognate

3 months ago

Right, but during the AWS outage that took these beds out presumably most of the owners had functioning WiFi.

HPsquared

3 months ago

Yeah, "works without any internet connection at all" is perhaps overkill for an AWS outage but I'll allow it.

mcphage

3 months ago

But it should still work without functioning WiFi.

ashwoods

3 months ago

I'd venture to say that the person meant that these kind of devices should be designed to work "locally first".

NoPicklez

3 months ago

I think perhaps they mean it should just run locally, rather than without an internet connection at all