IoT pet feeder leaves pets hungry when servers crash

[Galenbo]

Well, your Internet connection can be much more unreliable than electrical power. You can suffer an outage. The router can hang. Your WiFi network can be rendered almost useless by a careless neighbor (or yourself!) buying one of those awful "TV transmitters" or a baby cam. Your ISP can experience connection problems to the network of the "cloud provider". There are too many failure modes.

Good you know this networking trivia.

Of course, most pets can not be left alone at home for a week, period.

So, buy a device that doesn't need constant network availability. Look at at the specs and tests instead of relying on a colourful package.
And, period, at least do a basic test of what happens when one of the working conditions isn't met.

[janoc]

Of course, most pets can not be left alone at home for a week, period. But that's an entirely different matter.

That's why in the era before ubiquitous smartphones, when people actually *gasp* talked to each other instead of "facebooking" and "twittering", you asked your neighbor or friend to feed your pet (and clean up their toilet, if needed). Certainly no problems with power or server outages there!

[CJay]

Of course, most pets can not be left alone at home for a week, period. But that's an entirely different matter.

That's why in the era before ubiquitous smartphones, when people actually *gasp* talked to each other instead of "facebooking" and "twittering", you asked your neighbor or friend to feed your pet (and clean up their toilet, if needed). Certainly no problems with power or server outages there!

I agree, everybody needs good neighbours, they should talk. That's when good neighbours become good friends.

But, I live in a commuter area where the street empties in the morning until late in the evening so socialising with them becomes difficult.

That's not to say it doesn't happen but I know very few of them.