Build Your Own Open Source Twittering Power Meter

ptorrone writes "Open source hardware company 'Adafruit Industries' has released a 'Tweet-a-watt' kit. It's an open source power monitoring kit that mods an off-the-shelf power meter which can 'tweet' (publish wirelessly) the daily KWH consumed & Cumulative Kilowatt-hours to your Twitter account, Google App Engine, Facebook, IRC, whatever ... They recently won the 'GreenerGadget' design competition and have now released an open source hardware kit."

Re:Isn't that missing the point?

[CaptainPatent]

Unless you're living in the 80's, most households have a basic computer which is all it takes to email, tweet and connect to the internet. The only thing taking up additional power is the hardware to monitor it.

Another point is in order to read the power meter you generally need to wander outside in some hidden corner of your house, or down into a hidden location in the basement. It's really hard to keep that routine up. Adding the hardware may take just a touch more power, but at least that data is in a place that can be readily checked and the person can be much more aware of power usage.

Personally I think it's a rather brilliant idea.