14 DAY TRIAL // IoT World Europe in Berlin is an event that takes place between 5 and 7 October, and it will be host to a lot of cool new smart devices. Canonical is launching there a new initiative named The Internet of Toys.
The Internet of Things is a new type of smart devices that connect to the Internet, and that can be controlled remotely. The funny thing about these devices is that many of them can be controlled by apps, and they are not items that you would think are smart, like a fridge for example. Now, Canonical wants to push things even further with a new open source initiative called The Internet of Toys, which is just that.
Imagine that people will be able to buy smart toys, but not just for kids. Devices like drones, for example, can hardly qualify as toys for kids, but they are toys nonetheless, and there is a ton of other stuff that will soon qualify as toys, even if you don't think about them that way.
Canonical wants to power the world of toys
Canonical is looking to expands and exert influence in a market that just doesn't exist yet. Not too many toys have Internet connection or can be controlled by an OS, and that is why the company wants to have Ubuntu Snappy Core font and center.
"Hybrid Group, Erle Robotics and Canonical will launch "The Internet of Toys": an open source initiative that invites toy makers, hackers, IoT lovers and innovators to join us to build the next generation of toys around open source tools like Cyclon.Js, Gobot, Snappy Ubuntu Core, Snapcraft, ROS, Erle-Drones, Erle-Spiders, etc," reads the announcement made by Maarten Ectors, the guy in charge of the IoT side of business at Canonical.
If all of this talk about IoT still hasn't convinced you that this is the future, then just take a look at the image attached to the article. It's a guy mounting a laser on top of a Sphero Ollie as an early prototype for Internet of Toys, and you can't really beat that.