Pachube, and project2891 are both projects that want in their own modest way to network the planet, but from quite different motivations.

Pachube’s key aim is to ” to facilitate interaction between remote environments, both physical and virtual.” project2891 is Ben Dembroski’s Alt-w funded art project that “is a system of devices which can be collaborated with directly, without direct communication with original artist.”

What links them is the need to have a process by which devices can ‘talk’ to each other, a protocol. From Tom Igoes book “making things talk“, the rules for good communication are:

• listen more than you speak
• never assume
• agree on how you say things
• ask politely for clarification

I am stepping into using both of these systems, having made LightResponsiveDevice last year, and thinking further than just being responsive to light, but responsive to other inputs