Rory Sutherland's Blog

Rory Sutherland

By now you will have seen the wifi enabled fridge from LG in Korea. In Japan there is even a wifi enabled kettle, which posts to a blog every time it is switched on*. Here in Blighty, I suspect, you will soon be able to buy a network-capable Breville Sandwich toaster 2.0 - which invites random pissed Facebook friends to join you every time you switch it on after 11pm. 

Meanwhile our ingenious colonial chums have had a still better idea. They have added wireless internet connectivity to that old 1970s bedroom staple the clock-radio - and in the process created something quite beautiful and charming.

The result of this spectacular hybridisation is called the Chumby and you can find out more - or even assemble a virtual Chumby - at www.chumby.com.  I initially bought one from eBay; it was faulty. However, in the all too brief ten minutes for which it actually worked I found it so enthralling that I promptly went and bought another one.

Chumby is a clock - or rather it is several clocks, the design of which you can choose at the website (one clock widget - shown below - is charmingly retro; another, inevitably called 'clockr', which randomly selects its individual digits from live flickr updates, qualifies as a minor work of art). The Chumby is also an Internet radio (useful if, like me, you find that US National Public Radio craps on Radio 4). It plays tracks from your iPod. And, as you would expect, it wakes you up in the morning - in my case at the crack of 9am.

But, at the times when the Chumby is not displaying one of your various selected clocks, the small screen displays in rotation your choice of a spectacular variety of Flash widgets, many created by enthusiastic amateurs. Some of these are amazingly useful. One (thank you, Gingerbeardman, whoever you are) displays the live departure times of trains from any UK railway station; as I sit here typing, it is warning me that the next train from Sevenoaks to Charing Cross is running five minutes late. Still more widgets tell you the local weather, the latest news stories from the NY Times and the BBC, the WPP stock price (I might remove that one), a live webcam picture of the Abbey Road pedestrian crossing, the next raising time for Tower Bridge (18:30 tomorrow, since you ask), my Twitter friends' updates (Russell Davies has landed in Helsinki), my latest Facebook photographs and a live photograph of The Golden Gate Bridge. I am also asking the Ogilvy caterers to put out the lunch menu as an RSS feed so I can display that as well. Well, why the hell not?

Very occasionally the device displays advertisements. Not a problem. Some of them are even quite cute, too.

Now, as you read this, the nerdier half of you will be salivating (especially when I tell you it runs on Linux). The other half, I suspect, will be close to vomiting. Not a problem - I know this is exactly the kind of informational device which polarises people. Me, I love the thing to death. I have always been a massive fan of what is now fashionably called "branded utility". This is the perfect way to deliver it. 

* The kettle is not quite as mad as it sounds - it is designed to help you keep a discreet eye on elderly relatives. Like older Brits, older Japanese people only stop making tea when seriously ill or dead.