I know that several Asian countries have the ability to use their some cell phones and PDAs at the checkout to pay for their purchases, and even use them at vending machines. Here in the USA there are a lot of cities which are setting up city-wide WiFi access, and there is some experimentation with paying for purchases using wireless devices. In addition, there is software available to let PDAs and smartphones act as remote controls for various devices, though using it on a coffee machine is a new one. However, I was unable to find out any information about the project underway in Belgium as I don't speak the language and the translators I use failed miserably. Do you happen to know of a site that explains the project in English, as I am truly interested in in the topic.
Thanks,
John
Already heard about it?
Since april this year (2005) is a project started by i-City (http://www.i-city.be) in Hasselt (Belgium) to integrate the Pocket PC in civillian life.
So the PPC would been used for domotics (setting up the coffee-machine, as remote control for tv...), for information about promotions in horeca / stores when you drive into the city, location-based-services, ...
The programmers for the applications they called the "Alfa's", at the moment they are still searching for "Beta's", or in other words Test-users.
The Beta's will testing the application made by the Alfa's.
For more information check next sites:
http://www.eivanmij.be
http://www.i-city.be
What is your opinion about these kind of projects?
Is it good or not? Why it is / is not?
You know some projects that are just like this one? (pls type the url also)
Thanks,
MJ.
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