They require Google connectivity to change the temperature through the app. You can always change the temperature using the thermostat itself. Although it is absurd that there is zero local connectivity, this is Google we're talking about. If they allowed that, it would be trivial to just keep the thermostat offline and not allow Google to siphon up your precious data.

I want to know what kind of signals they are getting from your temperature preferences. Something like "wow, this person keeps their house hot, let's send them marketing for vacations in the tropic?"

It tells them what times of which days of week you are at home, which can be used to infer other lifestyle buckets based on age and gender and purchase histories.

I'm wonder if a line of "smart IoT" devices where the assumption is that cloud-down is the primary use case (and cloud-connected is a secondary "nice to have" mode even if that's how it's used 90%+ of the time) would succeed?

Phillips Hue devices work without the cloud connection.

That's how Apple HomeKit works. It's LAN only unless you have an always-connected AppleTV, HomePod or iPad acting as a gateway to the internet

If I'm remembering right, if you do have one of those acting as a hub, it should work fine in that capacity on a local network with no internet. This lets you have fully local automation triggers, among other things.

Well I'd love that kind of systems; in my flat, the heating and ventilation is controlled by a central server that is managed by a local startup.

When I lose internet access, or the server is not reachable (and this is super frequent), my floor heating (my only source of heat) stops running, and ventilation starts.

Have to wait for someone to reboot the networked server, but they work only Mon-Fri, 10am to 5pm.

That's staggering to learn! I'm glad I've avoided Nest now.

A lot of IOT things go through the internet because it's easier than making network device detection work. Everything going through a single process is also just simpler to test and make sure there are fewer surprises or issues with having two different methods of control.

You can still use it physically, just it won't work over network...which seems absolutely reasonable (its a smart device that has a backup non-smart function)

I'm glad it seems reasonable to you. It does not seem reasonable to me.

This is essentially the Google philosophy, and it stands in contrast to the Apple philosophy. Yes, Nest is ex-Apple people and followed this bad pattern before their acquisition by Google, but still.

Apple HomeKit-certified devices don't communicate with Apple. They establish secure local connections and operate locally. For home devices, this makes good sense to me. It means, however, that HomeKit-certified devices have to be powerful enough to establish secure local connections, which the first couple of generations of IoT devices were not.

I'm willing to wait longer and pay extra to get devices that don't require a third-party corporate intermediary. Anything else seems unreasonable to me.

It seems reasonable to not be able to control a local device from your local network without calling home to Google first?

This isn't a defense, but Nest products worked this way before Google bought them. A lot of smart home stuff works this way, I am guessing because it's easier to setup, manage and troubleshoot.

Unfortunately it makes buying this stuff a pain because you have to research who owns what and what kind of control you have.

I just buyed an air cleaner, and amongst other I looked at the one by Xioami. To operate, requires you to install an app which tracks you locations and sends it to Xiaomi servers. This really troubled me.

I ended up buying one which can be operated without an app, which there seems to be fewer and fewer.

Xiaomi is connected-oriented brand. Choosing from other brands is better to avoid connectivity.

Can't you just turn the dial?