Apple hires NFC expert to manage mobile commerce, prepare to pay with your iPhone
By Sean Hollister 
posted August 15th 2010 11:11PM
posted August 15th 2010 11:11PM
posted August 15th 2010 11:11PM
A look back on popular stories from today in a specific year.
Now that we've thrown 'em off the trail, use the form below to get in touch with the people at Engadget. Please fill in all of the required fields because they're required.
Hey, anyone willing to take on the Ticketmaster evil empire is worthy of support in my book...
@Samurai Jack Yeah, like apple wouldn't just partner with Ticket Master. I don't think they are trying to get into the ticket brokering business, just the transactions business for mobile payments.
@frank da tank Very true. But the possibility also exists that this could be the next iBooks type of situation. Or perhaps enable someone else to use their methodology to rise to the occasion. We can but hope...
Yet another way for apple to get their grubby hands on a % of each transaction
And for the few posts from people saying they've had issues with scanning barcodes displayed on screen, it probably has something to do with the barcode scanner used. a classic "oldfashoed" laser barcode scanner isn't going to pickup dittly squat from an LCD or OLED screen. The laser light has to be able to reflect off a white surface and be absorbed by the bars for the photocell in the scanner to pick it up. The newer scanners that use a CCD/CMOS camera sensor should work with this type of scanning, generally these types will use a laser to draw a target, and then when scanning is performed the entire field of view of the scanner is flooded with red/ir light from LEDs. The resolution of the screen should have nothing to do with it, a 320x240 screen could make readable barcodes so long as the wide and narrow bars are clearly defined, and its not some down/upsampled image where bars are borderline between pixel lines
@d0ug
Just tone your brightness levels down a bit. Most retail stores have super-high florescent lighting that makes your iPhone feel self-conscious and it tries to compensate. Sliding down to about 50-60% brightness usually does the trick.
@Tyre It has alot to do with the type of scanner. try this simple experiment at home if you have a laser pointer. hold some product with a barcode near a white surface a few inches away, a wall works good. swipe the laser pointer over the barcode while looking at the bounceback on the other surface you should visibly see bright and dim pulses as you scan over the bars. this bounce back is what a classic scanning laser barcode scanner uses to read the barcode a photodiode picks up these pulses.
Now try the exact same thing with your phone displaying a barcode on its screen, i bet you get nothing except for the laser dot bouncing off the screen like its a mirror.
Scanning of barcodes from a phones screen will only work with the CMOS/CCD style scanner which basically takes a photo of the barcode and then software in the scanner decodes the photo
Why would one want concert e-tickets anyways? These are generally something I like to keep as a memento, especially with they are uniquely designed.
Apple and ticketmaster will love these. apple gets a cut, and etickets cant be "scalped" or traded on sites like stubhub.
Really, ease up people. Bitching about how Apple wants to make money. Of course they DO! They are a publicly traded corporate entity, it's an inherent rule of corporate behavior! Grow, increase revenue and cut costs. You may not like it, and that's fine but don't humanize, then demonize a corporation for doing what a corporation does.
@frank da tank
Well said.
Yeah, I've seen this idea bandied around since the 90's when I got into writing mobile software (and have seen smart guys try and start up companies on this idea and fail pretty hard). Here's the problem: your "pay by mobile" system has to be a fully open standard, because the stores don't want to put all their eggs in one basket (or one mobile vendor). It's great for specific applications, like the aforementioned concert tickets, but if you're talking about real seamless electronic purchasing where your phone automates the process of making a withdrawal from your bank/paypal acct. and, say, using it to pay your grocery bill electronically, stores don't want to hassle with that technology cost if only one brand of phone can do it. But they also frequently are irrationally frightened of open standards because they think open means "insecure". Apple's going to lock that thing down to their platform because that's how they roll, and that's going to be a problem for them in the long run.
@zullnero i think if anyone is successful at rolling this out its going to be one of the existing credit card companies or paypal. No one is going to want to be locked into one vendor's solution, well no one but apple fanboys
As far a contact-less payments, there's already a far simpler solution, RFID enabled credit cards, no fussing with the phone. Just put your wallet in proximity of the reader and you're done. Dont want to carry your wallet? slip your RFID enabled credit card into your phone's case lol
@zullnero also considering that RFID enabled credit cards have been around for years, i've personally had one for at least 4 years now. There are only a few places that have upgraded their credit card terminals to accept RFID, not even the big retailers target and walmart currently accept these cards, including in some of the newly remodeled walmarts here in Tampa where they have completely changed out the POS systems with all new upgraded equipment. I think my most frequent use of the RFID on my card is at coke machines. id rather use the card, than stick $2 in and get back 75cents in change
I have a feeling its going to be quite some time until there's a widely accepted cell phone payment system in place
@d0ug I agree...I own two blink-enabled cards from Chase...a debit and a credit card. Most drink machines at transit stations in the NYC area have been fitted with the new credit card readers, and is much more convenient than dealing with change...especially when I don't have any.
Security nightmare. No thanks.
Apple doesn`t read the source code of the apps. Even if it was possible to do so for every app , security issues can be staring you in the face , and still not see them.
Wow, Apple hired a man that may or may not work on an NFC project, so things got real on the pay with your phone front!!!
Meanwhile Nokia said that all of its smartphones from 2011 onwards will support NFC, so if paying with your phone gets real it will be because of Nokia not Apple
@ChrisSsk
When did anyone on Endadget last buy a Nokia? A few had an N900 that was chucked in eBay a month later
@ChrisSsk
Forget Nokia. That company has already hit the skids. Even if Nokia smartphones do get NFC first, there won't be enough of them to make an impact or major claim that they had it first. When Apple sells millions of NFC-equipped iPhones it will like they invented it and will be the greatest thing since sliced bread. NFC will become significant to U.S. consumers when Steve Jobs steps up on stage says it is. Nokia?? Pffft.
@MosesusedaniPad maybe in the US but theyre still doing well everywhere else.
most likely were going to see 2 variants of NFC pop up the standard one which will likely be used all over the rest of the civilized world with nokia pioneering it, then apple's bastardized version which will probably be DOA aisde for using inside an apple store. I dont think NFC is going to take off till its seriously backed by the major credit card companies, and then theyll just sell it directly, why give apple a cut of each transaction too?
I mean look at all the other alternate payment methods that the rest of the civilized world has that we dont. ATM cards with smart chips in them, the ATM or PIN pad physically interrogates the ATM card to verify its real. AMEX attempted to bring this to the US in the late 90's i remember their cards with the smart chips in them and a reader for your PC, you couldn't make an online purchase without physically inserting the card into the reader to verify you actually had possession of the card
RFID in cards, can perform similar function to the smart chip cards without having to physically stick it into a reader slot, sorta catching on here in the states, but none of the huge retailers are supporting this yet. as i posted earlier my biggest use of the RFID on my credit card has been soda machines, it doesn't seem like many others are taking RFID seriously
Im sure 20 years down the road were still going to be swiping our insecure passive magstripe cards though POS Pin terminals as we do today
interesting idea but if this idea costs other companies or stays exclusively on the iphone, its going to fail like many other sony patents have done before. interesting idea that expands on an originals ones from a few years ago.
thanks but no thanks! paying 500-1000 dollars on a phone so it can make it easier for me to get 30 dollars concert tickets. no its okay. I'll be fine going to the box office after booking online and getting proper tickets that won't die on me.
Apple's looking for another useless scapegoat to fire in the event of some future grievance with the iPhone 4 or iPad.
@MosesusedaniPad
That's possibly the dumbest argument I've ever heard. I'm sure Apple spent all that time and money hiring Papermaster because they only wanted him as a scapegoat. Because Apple has a history of doing that, right?
Been using e-tickets with mobile for last 5 years already. Like train tickets just comes as mms to phone and it has bar-code that hey read from screen at train. Even old 6680 screen was already enough to make that work.
NFC might make it more fast and give more options. About apple they just will add some apple tax there and screw customers more hard to number 2.
can you buy a white iPhone 4 with it?
It's a barcode scanner, not a time machine.
I personally LOVE having airline boarding passes on my iPhone...I travel out of LGA quite a bit and Delta offers this. Check in via mobile website, an SMS is sent to the phone with a link you can click on before leaving for the airport, snap a screenshot of the barcode on the webpage, and keep it moving. Works great.
Why don't they hire someone to fix this damn os4.0. Can't stand it anymore. Apps crash all the damn time!
@DjGruv
It's not iOS 4, iOS 4 is actually really stable. If all apps crash all the time you should just do a restore and that will very likely fix it. If it's only a few apps, it's probably the apps themselves, not the OS.
@Jack Everyone I know that went 4.0 has this problem. Even on the iphone4. Same issue. Not to mention how slow the phone is now. I did do a restore. Didn't help at all. iPod and SMS even crash
Totally unrelated, but can anyone tell me where the "i" in iPod came from? What does it stand for or signify? Just wondering why it wasn't called the aPod? Anyone know? Or does EVERYONE know?
@mcaldero
It stands for Internet. It started with the iMac, and Apple wanted to continue the "i" branding so they called it an iPod even though it really had nothing to do with the internet back then.
@Jack Oh okay thanks Jack!
Humanity just keeps disappointing me...
Lots of people have forgotten what phones really are for in such little time.
@Diabolus in Musica
Yes, progress is so disappointing. I'm still outraged that we're not all using horse drawn carriages to get around, aren't you? And washing machines? Forget it, I still go down to the river and wash my clothes there, let them dry on a rock.
Because progress is so "disappointing".
So, does this mean anything for those credit card swip apps?
LOL apple always thinks their first at doing things
nokia as been doing this for 6 years now and in japan 2002 they still use inferred on there phones to transactions