Unlike radio-frequency identification (RFID) and other existing contactless payment systems, NFC chips allow two-way information exchange by rolling an RF transmitter and reader into one five-millimeter package. That means the chip can also take in data, such as a receipt zapped to it by a cash register or a bus schedule from a tag embedded in a bus-stop sign.
The technology is expected to start hitting stores next spring both embedded in cell phones as well as in miniSD-card-size adapters from SanDisk which will be able to add NFC to any smartphone with a Symbian operating system.
Over the past two days I have received two emails from two distinct companies both claiming to have found the ultimate business man or woman’s ubiquitous white-board dream. Both Scanr and Clicktoscan ( from Realeyes3D) allow you to scan, copy, and fax with your camera or camera phone. The idea is that you take a picture of a document, whiteboard, or business card (both currently in beta), e-mail the picture to them and then they do the rest, perform OCR on the file and send you a PDF version of the document. The whole process only takes about a minute or two, and the content of the PDF file that is delivered to you is tagged and easily searchable. This, the claim, provides a great way to keep digital copies of important documents, and it’s truly like having a FedEx Kinko’s with you all of the time.
I have given both of them a whirl and while the ability to send directly to a fax machine (or email) by placing the number or email address in the subject line of the MMS is pretty damn cool, neither ClickToScan nor ScanR won me over enough to get me to stop using an application like Shozu to record my ubiquitous camera phone needs. UPDATE: Andy Tiller, CTO of Shozu, has shown me a great way to converge Shozu with ClickToScan… UPDATE bellow.
For one thing, their is just to much involved in the processes of both ClickToScan and a Scanr. Its not as simple as taking a picture with your camera phone and sending it via MMS to either scan@clicktscan.com or doc@scanr.com. First you have to figure out your camera phone’s pixel resolution and set it to various settings some of which I have never heard of (at least on the Nokia N70 or 6682).
I liked ClickToScan’s web interface on this end in that when you put in your camera phone’s information it told you what to expect from it when using their service. I was shocked that the N70 got a lower usability score than the 6682.
Nevertheless, both sites pretty much tell you that for white boards the minimum pixel resolution is 1 and for business cards and and docs its 2 (which already eliminates a good number of American users). I tried both services using a Nokia 6682 (1.3 mega pixels) and a Nokia N91 (2 mega pixels). With the 6682 I took a picture of a whiteboard and a document. The results from ScanR and ClicktoScan where both far from satisfactory.
From scanR I received the SMS on both phones: service@scanR.com() The image you sent to ScanR is too small. Set your camera to 1 megapixel [it is] or higher resolution and fine mode [it is].
ClicktoScan sent the image to my email but told me that Clicktoscan has scanned your image but the resulting document may not be satisfying because the resolution of your original image is too low. To avoid this: (1) Ensure that your camera phone is 1 megapixel or greater [it is]. (2) Ensure that your camera is set to the appropriate resolution and image quality (it is) and (3) Ensure that your camera is not resizing images (see below) [oi! another thing to worry about!] They tell you solve the MMS resizing problem by setting the “creation mode” in your MMS settings to “unlimited” or “free” which worked, in my case, but also means that some of the receiving phones I try to send an MMS to may no longer support the message (unless I remember to switch back to guided mode). Besides, switching the MMS mode did not change the problem. But at least Clicktoscan brought this issue up.
As expected, the same problems existed with the 2 mega pixel N91.
To the average user I believe these companies are already beginning to ask to much when they ask you to take the picture and send it via MMS, especially here in the States where unlimited data plans are cheaply available (especially to the business types they are targeting). I believe a data uploading solution like that of Shozu is much better equipped for this type of thing.
Honestly, I only fiddled about the programs for an hour or so, achieving minimal to no success which for me means if I can’t get it, my dad or girlfriend or aunt definitely wont get it. They are not going to dedicate more than 15 min to figuring out something like this. They get Shozu cause it’s easy.
To be fair, the services work fine when using a regular camera and one of their up-loaders… but this is already missing the point of on-the-spot mobile phone to scan ubiquity they are shooting for isn’t it. So I guess, in a way, its more the fault of the Camera phone manufacturers (image quality) and the networks (MMS size sending issue) then their own but then again that is what they have to work with so perhaps this type of service is to young or early.
But then again, Shozu works just fine with all types of issues and probably, if they wanted to, integrate this type of functionality (and in a way already do). You can now set up your favourite email addresses and blogs in ShoZu - and then email or post your photos and videos in seconds. What do you say AttillatheChicken… Shozu to fax?
UPDATE: As I mentioned by stating that”and in a way they already do…” Shozu CTO Andy Tiller has pointed out that you can actually use Shozu to solve a lot of the MMS and image quality problems. I tried it using both services and it worked like charm! Yeah Shozu for saving the day! See comments bellow for more
If I where going to go with one or the other I would have to suggest ClickToScan in that their website and information was a lot more informative and user friendly. Also with 50 Mb of storage, you can securely store and forward your documents from your phone, your account or your PC, whenever you need to (when it works). With clicktoscan you can go back to documents you’ve previously scanned, either from your web browser or from your phone. In that sense it is a real document management system. Clicktoscan will also send you something, even if its screwed up, which at least makes you feel like you have accomplished something and at the very least can try to remind you of what you where aiming your camera phone at when you attempted to capture it.
Anyways, this weeks Carnival is jammed pack with exciting posts and stuff! Including the winners of last months Hosting and blog posts awards. Back in May, we announced that Khosla Ventures would be sponsoring the Carnival of the Mobilists, as their way of reaching out to the blogging community and everyone in mobile. The sponsorship would take the form of two monthly prizes - $500 for the best host of the month and $250 for the best post. We’re delighted to say that the votes are now counted, the recounts processed, chads examined and the appeals considered and we can announce the June winners. Go to Smartmobs post for more.
The Carnival of the Mobilists is a weekly tour through blog posts of people in the center rings of design, development and implementation of our new global mobile communications. Mobilists bloggers enter their posts and you read the finest, freshest writing in the field. (If you are a blogger, you can enter too. The details are here.) The Carnival travels each week to a host site, which this week is SmartMobs.
Have you heard the news? Over the next two months Nokia will be testing their Wi-Fi Internet mobile calling (also known as UMA) with 50 families in the Northern Finish town of Oulu near the polar circle. Nokia will thus be putting their Nokia 6136 UMA phone, announced this past February at 3GSM, into action. For those of you that don’t know UMA, which stands for “unlicensed mobile access” allows mobile users to make calls over the Internet when they are in range of an unlicensed wireless network such as Bluetooth or Wi-Fi.
When the user steps out of range of the WifI connection the connection will automatically seamlessly revert to a GSM, GPRS or UMTS mobile phone network.
The only phone Nokia has out now that is capable of such a feat is the 6136 pictured above from when I was visiting their HQ in Espoo.
So basically, the UMA WifI technology connects to a Wifi connection and tunnels it directly to our carrier thus greatly enhancing coverage areas to anywhere a wifi connection can be found (thus also increasing indoor coverage). The seamless hand-off between the Wifi and the network is great too because it does not hold you down to one spot like a landline.
Katrin runs her day job in an organization called N-TEN—an umbrella association of nonprofit technologists and the people that provide technology service to nonprofits and civil society organizations. She is also very involved in MobileActive. MobileActive, as you know, is a global network of nonprofit and non-governmental organizations, mobile technologists, and grassroots activists who are using mobile phones in their civic activism.
Thats right, British scientists studying the disease claim to have discovered the main cause of Mad Cow when they accidentally came across a pack of Friesian Holsteins chatting away on mobile phones.
“We knew mobile phones were dangerous, and we knew cows were intrigued by wireless technology, but when we saw them using the mobiles, we made the connection right away,” said lead researcher Kevin Barrington, who spotted the culprits at a dairy farm outside Kent.
With the already existing concern linking cell phones to brain cancer this will prove to be yet another headache for the mobile industry which has already dismissed the British claims. “To even insinuate that cell phones could somehow be the cause of this disease is as absurd as the notion that cows could use cell phones at all,” said Nokia spokesperson Nigel Wanthorpe.
I have been using it to get on Subway and have been loving it I simply take out my key-chain, walk up to the participating turnstile, tap the… tapping thing you have to tap…. and walk on through.
There have stories for a while now that Mastercard and Motorola have teamed up on a field trial of mobile phones enabled with MasterCard® PayPass. But most of these stories go back to 2004 and there has not been much word yet. But just a couple weeks ago I met someone involved with this project who had an RFID PayPass tag installed on his phone.
I watched as shocked employees watched the charge clear as he swiped his phone across the PayPass machine at a local Duane Reade here in Manahatahn. Of course in Japan this is nothing new. But in America this is shockingly new and probably still years away. But its coming soon.
And soon, this unnamed worker told me, the chips will be two way so that one will be able to swipe my card over the tag to pay for something say, like a ringtone. Oh oh Cingular… watcha going to do then?
As the article puts it, in the US it can be easier to end a marriage than leave a loveless relationship with T-Mobile, Cingular, Sprint or Verizon. Some of the tricks the article points are obvious such as complaining you want to cancel your service because its not up to par and then backing that up by filing official complains with the Federal Trade Commission and the Better Business Bureau. Some of them are quirky and interesting such as telling them that you are moving to an area that is off their service map (Alaska or Wyoming). The article says that they are not legally required to cut you loose but claims that some frustrated consumers have had success. I once tried this approach to get them to unlock a phone. Didn’t work. Other solutions such as “Joining the Army” is just not an option for some (they ask for documentation).
One solution that did intrigue me, however, was via the market-based approach provided by Celltradeusa.com. Many folks don’t realize that they can drop their cell phone contract without paying a termination fee, which typically runs as much as $150 to $200 per line. All they have to do is find someone willing to take the contract over for its remaining term. The formed by industry executives startup allows unhappy cell phone customers to link up with people who would like to sign up on to their plan (on a time based discount of course). Unhappy cell phone customers can sell their contracts for only $20 and thus free themselves up to sign up and get that shiny new GSM phone they always wanted (can you tell where my bias is :-)). The system works and the person who buys your contract legally takes it over. Increase your chances of selling your plan by dressing up your profile with cash bonus offers or other perqs.
It pays off for buyers as well in that they can get a contract with a much shorter term than the now-standard 24 months, pay no activation fees and, in most cases, receive a free cell phone from the seller. But you don’t get to keep your number. The
Consumer Action
Ditching Your Cell Contract
By Aleksandra Todorova Published: July 13, 2006
Click here for more stories by Aleksandra Todorova.
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THREE MONTHS AGO, 29-year-old Mark Girgis decided he’d had enough of T-Mobile’s dropped calls on his frequent business trips to upstate New York, Vermont and southern New Jersey. The problem: Dropping his contract seven months early would have cost him a $200 early-termination fee.
So when a co-worker told him about Celltradeusa.com, a web site that would help him find someone to take over his T-Mobile contract for a $19.99 registration fee, Girgis decided to give it a try. It paid off immediately. “I got emails the same day from people who wanted my phone,” Girgis says. Within days, a buyer from Delaware got approved by T-Mobile to take over the contract, the transfer was completed and Girgis promptly switched to another carrier.
Many folks don’t realize that they can drop their cell phone contract without paying a termination fee, which typically runs as much as $150 to $200 per line. All they have to do is find someone willing to take the contract over for its remaining term.
Granted, this may not be easy: Beyond your family and friends — who probably have contracts of their own to gripe about — who’s there to ask? That’s why a year ago Eric Wurtenberg and his brother launched Celltradeusa.com, which connects consumers who want to get rid of their contract with those looking to assume one. This way, sellers can drop their cellphone carriers for a fraction of the penalty fee, while buyers can get a contract with a much shorter term than the now-standard 24 months, pay no activation fees and, in most cases, receive a free cell phone from the seller. The service is free for the buyers
Since it launched a year ago, about 75,000 users a month have visited the site, which typically sports at least 1,000 active “for sale” ads, according to Eric Wurtenberg, the companies founder.
While the carriers will do this for you they also point out that this should not be done without some caution. Some good carrier dropping and trading practices can be found toward the end of the article here.
Of course, you could also always shrink your current plan to the bare minimum no frills attached plan, no text messages, no internet, no nothing. Wired points out that depending on the number of months you have left this option could be cheaper than paying the typically prorated termination fee (around $200). But honestly, what’s the fun in that. You also have to be careful with that one because depending on the plan you knock down to, it could re-extend your contract for another two years.
With the unfortunate events that are occurring presently in the Middle East I thought it would be a good time to bring to your attention a little project underway by my pal Erik Sundelof (a fellows at Reuters Digital Vision Program at Stanford University, a program that aims to develop technology to advance humanitarian goals in underserved communities).
Erik thought it would be interesting to see what the people on the ground (on both sides) are seeing and be able to report back live as it happens. So Erik has set up a Typepad blog that both sides can post to via their cell phones. The system uses a positioning solution developed Erik while a fellow at Stanford. The positioning system allows an end user, amongst other things, to determine if the mobile content was really sent from near or on location. Erik also built an SMSBlog for MobileActive.org, the online community for mobile technology and social activism.
But all of this is really part of his larger “In The Field Online” project in which Erik imagines every cell phone as a citizen media outlet. The point is to allow people ‘in the field’ to report news stories (or any other types of content for that matter) to the web using just a cell phone, but is developed in such a way as to be extremely extensible. As such one can basically push any piece of information - text, audio, graphic, picture, video from any cell phone to the web. It is the natural extension to citizen journalism as it creates the vehicle for people without internet to be able to get their voices heard on the internet.
The idea just came naturally to him:
I started to think about what would be my first thought after a car bomb went off. Certainly not to run to an Internet cafe. That’s probably the last thing I would think about. But I might call my friends with my cell phone to tell them I’m all right. Then you have your phone out, so now the possibility is that you could also record that, shoot it and send it to Reuters, the BBC or wherever. That would be a great tool to really create a vehicle and channel for those people to get their frustration out, that would help the democracy part.
Recently Erik was interviewed by Mark Glaser at MediaShift PBS to talk about citizen media and the future of its implications on the media landscape. “I truly believe cell phones are the right way to go here.” Erik tells me. “Combine this with the proper business model and you have a really powerful tool.” Or as Erik himself put it in the interview:
“The key here is that the media organizations need to realize they are losing control. They can’t really control [the news] now because people are posting this stuff to other blogs. I think it would be better to merge traditional reporting with citizen media rather than have a [totally] new media.
To take the best of the old fashioned news organizations and bring in the power of the bloggers, because you have so many people investigating. Mix them and you have an extremely good organization and you’ll have content that’s really important in finding out the truth.”
So, in the spirit of the project, people in Israel or Lebanon can now post to the blog by simply sending an SMS to the number +1 650 455 2692 (yes it’s a US number but this is an experiment more or less, Erik is working on getting a more local number). Pictures can be sent via MMS (as well as just posting) by sending an Email to mms@inthefieldonline.net. All messages for now must start with a “TP” and end with a “STOP.” If you want to include a title in your message, text as follows: “TP” add a title here “BODY” yada yada “STOP.” WIthin the next couple of days, Erik has told me that the capability to post videos to the blog will also be made available.
If you are not reporting on the crisis in the Middle East but want to try Erik’s tool out anyways try this very simple showcase here - http://inthefieldonline.net/showcase. Step by step instructions are as follows:
2. Choose to send that via a Picture Message/Multimedia Message/MMS (or email if you would prefer that)
3. Send this message to show@inthefieldonline.net (of course short-codes are supported.)
4. Just watch the computer screen and you will see the post pop up on its own.
The simplicity also exists for SMS:s and it has been tested in most continents.
At the moment, he’s working on a cooler version of the service in the hopes of attracting Silicon Valley funding, or perhaps paying customers who run newspaper sites or other media outlets. So VC listen up. MOblogging could possibly be the next big thing. The blog Mobhappy has already made this easy for you to understand. His hope is to build an open source software platform with a programming code that can be improved and modified by anyone; to enable people to send in photos or video to central sites or to their blogs or websites of their choice. The simpler, the better.
If you are a volunteer nonprofit organization or political campaign you are probably very interested already.
The interview by the way is fantastic and has loads of information and answers to questions you might have about the technology.
WOW! That did not take long. A couple of days ago I wrote a post on Citibanks and Mastercards new mobile RFID PayPass technology and what it means in terms of mobile payment solutions. “And soon,” I wrote in the article, the chips will be two way so that one will be able to swipe my card over the tag to pay for something say, like a ringtone.” Well, last Friday CNN picked up a story from Popular Science about a new wireless standard called Near Field Communication (NFC) which will enable cell phone waving payments at cash registers everywhere.
