jdenning
4 hours ago
Smart Beds Helped Them Sleep on a Cloud. Then the Cloud Crashed
19 pointsposted 6 hours ago
by Animats10 Comments
Youden
3 hours 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 hours 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.
1shooner
3 hours 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.
ashwoods
2 hours ago
I'd venture to say that the person meant that these kind of devices should be designed to work "locally first".
NoPicklez
2 hours ago
I think perhaps they mean it should just run locally, rather than without an internet connection at all
HPsquared
3 hours 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 hours ago
Right, but during the AWS outage that took these beds out presumably most of the owners had functioning WiFi.