The Internet Home Alliance will work together to standardize systems and try to win converts to the new technologies, the 12 founding and two associate member companies announced Tuesday. The group said it was open to other partners. The Commerce Department just this week announced that 51 percent of American households now have computers, while 41.5 percent have Internet connections. The next step, device manufacturers and retailers say, is to connect Internet-enabled products so that consumers might, for instance, download a recipe from a cooking television show directly to their oven. Or they might be able to make home security or heating and cooling systems accessible remotely via handheld computers.
Some analysts are skeptical, though, of the consumer appeal of home networks.
A recent survey by Forrester Research Inc. showed that while 3.5 percent of households already have a network that links computers, only another 6 percent want one. Executives participating in the alliance announcement suggested the statistic will rise with the education campaign, which is expected to kick off in the first half of next year.