Between a Rock and a Hard Place

That's where ALL Insteon users find themselves.

I've had a good ride with Insteon. Until April 15, 2022.

I'll let you read Stacey on IoT's coverage. And even SmartLabs' feeble and belated attempt at explaining.

Where that leaves me and 1000s of other Insteon users is that their in-house equipment is fine but crippled due to https://connect.insteon.com being down for the count.

So, where do I go from here? There are several organizations out there trying to help.

But let's think about those solutions. They all cost a couple of $100s. And when you're done, you still have the Insteon switches and plugs which you can no longer buy and the Insteon hub which you can no longer buy. And the solutions put a server in your house that you have to support and maintain.

That's the Rock.

Then there are the alternatives. These mostly consist of Wi-Fi switches and plugs but depend on a cloud service.

What do you do if/when the cloud service goes away like Insteon did?

That's the Hard Place.

My decision is "Less is More." I'm going with Wi-Fi switches and plugs with no hub and server in the house. At least there are less moving parts.

And I plan to use Amazon Echo to create the automation schedules and routines. That gives me one degree of separation from the Wi-Fi switch and plug vendor's cloud service.