What is WebofThings.org?

It is a community founded late 2007 by two researchers/geeks Dominique Guinard and Vlad Trifa, during their doctorate at ETH Zurich and SAP Research Zurich. In 2011, after finishing their PhD thesis, Vlad and Dom became co-founders of a startup called EVRYTHNG which puts in practice the concepts we preached so long in labs. EVRYTHNG was also co-founded by serial-entrepreneurs Niall Murphy and Andy Hobsbawm.

The Web of Things has been a scrapbook to dump our thoughts and ideas on our research and work in the WoT space. Over time, it has grown into a community of interest around a physical Web. Unlike most Web 2.0 sites that are about advanced powerpoint-based engineering, we talk about the real things under the hood.

There are three main topics in here. First technologies – simply put, this section is only for geeks. It’s about coding, developing toys, plugging in kettles on the web (and we actually did that!). The second part is about new ideas and new technologies that are in the lab. It’s about research papers, and software philosophy, and about researchers worldwide. The third part is about end-users and products. It’s about products that exist, or at least should exist (or should not!). It’s about marketing and new ideas out there.

Thanks, but it doesn’t help. What is the Web of Things then?

Ok try this. It is an alternative vision to what the Web of tomorrow will look like. It’s about taking the Web as we know it and extending it so that anyone can plug devices into it. It’s basically about giving the Web eyes, ears, and all kinds of sensory appendices located anywhere on earth. It’s about seamlessly connecting the physical world with the virtual.

I still need more!

Well we wrote a whole book about the Web of Things!