The iPhone (News - Alert), when it came out, was so "kewl" with the way you could tilt it and it would correct the view from landscape to portrait and back again. It does this using an accelerometer and you would think the interaction with people was the epitome of implementation.

But there is so much more that it can do. Acclerometers are used to measure; motion, collision, wind, air, breathing, falls and earthquakes.

With the ability to measure wind also comes sound, so my friends at WindTrac can attach one to a gun to track, when the gun is fire and if it was in a fire fight. Through GPS they also tell what the location and direction of the shot was fired.

Should we expect that every M2M device will have one, not yet but it maybe that the value is the diagnostics offered to remote solutions.

If accellerometers are valuable in a PC to measure the vibration problems, it probably has merit in the feedback for systems that may have recurring failure issues.

I was looking for an innovator's dilemma in this space and just maybe, I am not schooled enough to see it. Right now the market is very segmented in the types of accelerometers used, but I could make a case that small and cheap combined with wireless can't solve a lot of the more costly uses.

It could be that the sheer volume of smart phones on the market tip these scales as well.

I need some accelerometers to track this.