A quick example, think about driving down the autobahn.Your intelligent car develops an engine problem. But instead of flashing you a warning light, it sends a message directly to the manufacturer over a wireless connection to the Net. The manufacturer systems diagnose the problem, and they transmit a fix back to the electronic complex in your car. In fact, that electronic fix is transmitted to all models of that car anywhere in the world without having to notify the owners. And that is good for the driver, so also better for the car maker. Instant performance information captured and sent immediately into product development and manufacturing, continuous feedback loop, continuous improvement, resulting in better cars, good for the consumer and competitive advantage for the businesses to get there first. How can any company with tens of millions of vending machines scattered all around the world know at any point what is selling, what is not selling, how much of an item is left, or when to send a rood driver to empty the coin box. A little chip in each machine could check and report on all of those items with ease, and even better. Why could not that machine include a thermal stack that told it, it is freezing today, drop the price by 10 pfennigs.
举个例子吧。想象一下你正在驾驶一辆新型汽车。当这辆智能汽车发生了一起引擎故障时,它不是向你闪烁警示灯,而是通过无线 Internet 连接直接向制造商发送信息。制造商的系统诊断出问题,然后向汽车的电子系统发回修理信息。实际上这个电子修理信息将在不通告其拥有者的情况下发向世界上所有这种型号的汽车。这对驾驶人员和制造商都是有好处的。性能信息随时都可以得到,并被立即发送给产品开发商和制造商,这样经过不断的反馈,不断的改进,就可以制造出更好的汽车,从而有益于消费者,使企业拥有领先的竞争优势。一家拥有遍布全世界上千万自动售货机的公司如何能够知道各个售货机中什么卖掉了,什么没卖掉,还剩多少,或者什么时候该派人去把售货机里的钱取出来。每台机器中安装一个很小的芯片就可以很方便地检查并报告所有这些信息,甚至可能做得更好。为什么不能在这些机器里装一个温度计呢?温度计会告诉售货机说,"今天很冷,价格下调 10 分尼。