Washington Works Blog

The Internet of Things, or IoT, has transformed how modern businesses operate in 2024. Whether you’re a manufacturer or a healthcare provider, the IoT offers previously impossible applications, from real-time data collection to smarter decision-making. Let’s explore some ways your business can use IoT in 2024.

You've likely encountered the concept of the Internet of Things (IoT), though its full implications might still be unclear. This is understandable, given the broad array of devices that fall under the IoT umbrella. Here, we aim to explore how the average business can harness the power of IoT to its advantage.

Whether or not you believe acronyms are an acceptable form of speech, some people might use them habitually or instinctively even for business communications. Of course, they don’t have much place in this context, but habits are hard to break. To address this issue, one innovative thinker has created a tool that can help determine if the acronym “LOL” is sincere or not.

The holiday season is getting busier and busier every year and with less and less time afforded to shopping and getting ready for the holiday, you may have overlooked that special someone on your holiday shopping list. This week, we give you three gadgets that would be really nice last minute gifts for that technology lover in your life

It probably isn’t a question you’ve put much thought to, but tell me: who do you think feels the greatest impact from card skimming schemes, where a payment card’s data is captured so a cybercriminal can make use of the card’s associated account? While it isn’t a good situation for anyone, some are impacted more than others.

I feel like we’ve been talking a lot about the horrifying cybersecurity threats that loom over our heads, and thought it might be nice to really appreciate just how gosh-darn cool some of these devices we all have can be instead. 

Discarded electronics, including the hardware that so many businesses cycle through, are a big problem—and not one that we can ignore for a variety of reasons. Let’s explore the issues surrounding e-waste, as well as what can be done to reduce it.

The holidays are some of the best times for technology lovers. Not only do manufacturers deliver the coolest tech for the busiest retail time of the year, there is a good chance that you may be gifted some of it. This week, we thought we would take a look at three popular gadgets that are flying off the shelves this holiday season. 

The strangest year in our lives is coming to a close and the holidays figure to be just as strange. With the COVID-19 pandemic still roaring away, there probably won’t be a lot of the events that are typical this time of year. That doesn’t have to ruin the time of year, however. Today, we thought that we would take a look at five cool tech gadgets and services that won’t break the bank, but will also be a cool addition under the tree or for your secret santa. 

Before 2020, remote work was already growing, albeit much more slowly than we see this year (for obvious reasons), but now that just as many workers are working from home (or have the option to work remotely) as are working in the office, we’re beginning to see that it is a functional business model. With many remote workers fairly new to it, we thought we’d see what gadgets members of the Gig Economy are using. 

We typically use this blog to share information about the technology that a business should be leveraging - but in this blog, we’ve decided to focus on a different group that is increasingly reliant on technology: students. As these pupils will someday make up the workforce and almost certainly utilize technology on a daily basis, it is important that their education reflects this increase in their curriculums. Here, we’ll consider some of the effects (good and bad) that this has had.

We hope we aren’t dating ourselves too much by mentioning computer punch cards, but they were once the means of inputting data into a computing device… at least, until the now-ubiquitous mouse and keyboard came into the scene. This variety of interfacing with our devices now seems to be one of the few ways to practically use them. However, other interfaces have emerged - do any of them stand a chance of unseating the keyboard and mouse?

Tablets are definitely becoming a staple in the consumer electronics world. For the longest time, the tablet PC was an expensive, clunky device that just didn't wow consumers. Some businesses had adopted tablets back in the day, but they were difficult to use, hard to support, and they simply didn't perform for the price tag. However, like many consumer electronics, Apple reinvigorated the tablet market with the original iPad, and now it would seem tablets are here to stay. The question is, are they right for businesses?