Whether you don’t feel like getting up to turn off the light or just want to know the weather, there’s an Internet of Things (IoT) gadget that can handle the task. The only problem is that most smart home devices don’t play well together. Project CHIP (Connected Home over IP) aims to change that.

These days, most smart home products actually don’t require a hub, making it simple for anyone to raise their space’s IQ with a simple smart speaker, smart light or smart plug. Companies have developed connectivity features enough to get their products online just through Bluetooth or a Wi-Fi network password. But risk complicating routines and automations with multiple apps and users, which is why a smart home hub makes sense for me. But does it for you?

Smart device capabilities are always growing, but users can’t be expected to proactively seek out and try them. As a result, AI-powered virtual assistants will increasingly present innovative new features to users without their even having to ask. As users interact with virtual assistants less, they rely on them more.

And now that it’s gone? That’s pretty much it for the smart remote, at least in the way that Harmony embodied it: a single controller to rule them all, with its own interface and touchscreen and deep bank of devices burned into its digital brain. A remote that you can program to execute a cascading sequence of actions.

If you have other smart devices in the home, a smart display can serve as a central hub for viewing and listening to your other devices. If you don’t have other smart products in the home, a smart display can still serve a valuable purpose by allowing you to watch videos, listen to music, view your calendar and more.

Budget smart home company Wyze has announced an expanded partnership with Noonlight that offers its customers 24/7 monitoring services. The new option, which comes with a small monthly fee, combines the DIY nature of Wyze’s smart home devices with Noonlight’s monitoring service, making the overall system a bit more useful for security-minded users.

Two years ago, Apple hired a former Microsoft executive to head up its smart-home efforts. At the time I took that as a sign that there might be hope in Apple taking a new direction in smart world realm.