Beware The Internet of Things  By 2020, more than 30bn fridges,
cars and coffee machines will be connected, all synergising and
secretly preparing for the day when they will join as one and
murder you     • The Guardian,     • Jump to comments () Alarm
clock The future? An alarm clock that knows when you are allowed
an extra hour in bed. Photograph: Kakimage/Alamy  Right now,
hordes of fevered scientists around the globe are pulling all-
nighter after desperate all-nighter. They haven't changed their
clothes for weeks. The walls of their laboratories are speckled
with fist-sized craters, each marking a different failure. Their
marriages are in ruin, their children strangers to them. And
it's all because Back to the Future: Part II was set less than
two years from now.  "Damn it, Bob," one jaundiced, coffee-
stained boffin is yelling at his semi-comatose colleague. "These
people were promised hoverboards. If we don't have a working
hoverboard in production by Christmas, there will be riots.
These animals will ha