There is a specific brand of passive-aggression reserved for smart lightbulbs that refuse to illuminate because a data center in Virginia had a hiccup. In an old house, we prefer our ghosts to be historical, not digital phantoms of corporate data harvesting.

In this session, we will share how we transformed our home into a fortress of local-first observability by completely severing our automation ecosystem from the cloud. You will see exactly how we rip commercial hardware out of their proprietary, data-hungry apps and pipe their telemetry directly into HomeAssistant.

This talk is part architectural blueprint, part hostage negotiation with household appliances. We will bring the Midwestern hacker energy to a live demonstration showing the setup required to keep a smart home running perfectly, even when there is a North American Fiber-seeking backhoe in the neighborhood. It is time to stop letting vendors dictate how your house operates.