Ding Dong, the doorbell’s dead!
Well… sort of. Welcome to the 21st century, gang.
Have you ever thought to yourself, “Gee, I really hate the sound of my doorbell! I’d much rather just have an alert text for in-person arrivals.” Well, dream no more. Thanks to the Texting Doorbell app, that can be your reality.
That’s right – the doorbell app. Just when you thought today’s self-secluding, socialization-shunning, Netflix-binging society couldn’t get any more hermitic. We have now reached the point where doorbells are trigger-inducing. As more and more people simply text “here” upon arriving at their friends’ abodes, this app seeks to … er, solve that problem.
How the Texting Doorbell app works
How will it work? Forbes tells us :
The Texting Doorbell is an IoT product that sends that text for you, after you press the button… the Texting Doorbell is not designed to replace your Ring or traditional doorbell, rather it sticks on the outside of your house and uses a WiFi connection through a yet-to-be-released iOS app to send you that important text that someone, whomever, is here.
Sarcasm aside, there may be some possible circumstances were the app has potential for real usefulness. In its defense, the app’s co-creator Daniel Greenberg told Forbes:
This product can be used by all sorts of people like parents with newborn babies. In the past, the bell would ring, children would wake, and it could be a nightmare for the parents. Another use case is for homes and offices without the correct wiring for bells. And of course, the generic use case is for all kinds of millennials. After testing this with loads of people, almost everyone preferred this product versus their old, boring doorbell.
Of course, there are still a myriad of responses to the usefulness of the app. Curtis Silver at Forbes muses:
I can’t help but think that actually texting someone is better than this button. Because texting allows you to know who is at the door, while the Texting Doorbell doesn’t. So if you aren’t expecting someone (I’m not), then getting a “here” text, especially if you aren’t at home, could be just as jarring as the original doorbell noise in the middle of the day.
How the app will perform in the market is yet to be seen; its release is projected for later this year. In the meantime, some of us remain perfectly contented with our tried-and-true-but-triggering doorbells, thank you very much.