Future High-Tech Products Range From ‘Living Lightning’ to Systems for House
A small Santa Monica company was mesmerizing passers-by with “living lightning” at its Consumer Electronics Show booth in Las Vegas a couple of weeks ago.
The new product, Eye of the Storm, contains harmless inert gases in a glass sphere. Put your finger on the sphere and streaks of magenta and blue light rush to meet it in a dazzling display--perhaps the Lava Lamp of late 1980s.
“The gases will interact with touch and respond to voice,” said Ken Holmes, vice president of sales for Rabbit Systems.
With comparable products costing $1,000 to $3,000, customers are expected to rally around Rabbit’s $179.95 gizmo, due in stores in April.
Eye of the Storm will double Rabbit’s product line. The start-up company last year sold 300,000 units of its VCR-Rabbit (suggested retail price: $89.95), which allows owners of videocassette recorders with more than one television to feed the video signal to any set in the house and control it with a wireless remote.
The product is a favorite of Roger Dooley, who a year ago published the first issue of Electronic House, the Journal of Home Automation. VCR-Rabbit, he said, is a relatively simple product that’s part of a growing emphasis on gadgets that will perform mundane or complicated tasks around the home.
Standing patiently in the long press-registration line at the show, Dooley acknowledged that the magazine might be a bit ahead of its time.
“We’re here in advance of the industry,” he said. “Right now, many of the big players are waiting for standards to develop in wiring and communications.”
Once they do, these companies--General Electric, Mitsubishi and others--will be pushing home systems that will go far beyond such simple tasks as turning lights and coffee makers on and off.
The new Space Age versions will “sense” intruders, smoke, light levels, temperature and occupancy and respond accordingly--becoming alarm system, thermostat, home entertainment system, communications network and cook’s helper all wrapped into one.
An Electronic House survey showed the industry to be worth $300 million last year, with $1 billion in sales projected by 1990.
