So, someone got me one of these for my birthday, and I finally got around to building a stand for the outdoor sensor (basically an oversized tameshigiri stand made with pressure-treated lumber).

A promised feature was remote access to your data through an iOS/Android app, so I downloaded the app …and it didn’t work. Surprise! You have to:

1. register your purchase online (and the form wouldn't let me hit Submit until I added demographic data...),
2. plug the USB cable on the indoor sensor into a computer,
3. download and run their PC/Mac app in the background,
4. and leave your computer on at all times to report the data.

I have two words for that, and the first one starts with “F”.

So, delete the Mac app, delete the iPhone app, unplug the cable, and now I have a standalone weather station. Oh, well, at least it wasn’t an Internet of Things Thing that sat on my wireless and took orders from The Cloud.

Update: now that the sun is down, I can report that the backlighting on the screen is bright. I won’t be needing a nightlight downstairs any more.