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Part One: An RFID-driven welcome application
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We installed 1 RFID Alien reader, at the entrance, on a walk-through arch. The arch reader’s signal was boosted by 4 antennas which are the white blocks.

We distributed simple conference name tag holders fitted with a thin passive RFID tag. These were connected to guests contact details – name, company, email address, LinkedIn. Beyond the arch we projected each name and company related to name card/tag detected. It would pick you up from about 3 meters from the screen. We calibrated it to pop your name a little before reaching the arch.

We also projected the same inside the exhibition space (as another projector was available), while on side monitors we showed a variation of the welcome screen with “person x, company x, has just entered this space”. These were turned off early due to mix-ups as there was a lot going on.

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Part deux: 2 physical “swap contact details” touchscreen consoles
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We placed the other two readers inside vertical touch screen units.

Your badge triggers your name to appear on the screen in a circle. The signal reached 2 meters. People in front of the unit blocked this reach signal working as a perfect damper to return only those in front of the screen to show up. Test, test. This is not really the best sequence series. Video would be great showing people interacting (coming soon).

As all participants had already given us their contact details before entering, we could easily hook people together. See the steps below. Pressing the central button sent emails to respective swappers. It worked! And of course there are a million add-ons that might be possible now, but heck this is just a prototype.

This project helped kick-start development of some new goodies for the Roomware Server. Due to the miserable software support we received from the RFID hardware suppliers, we were forced to write drivers for the RFID reader to communicate with the Roomware Server. So now the Alien reader is supported. What is the state of middleware for RFID? Anything else open source with lots of support for different readers? I assume that as we can read an Alien RFID reader that we are now supporting all Gen 2 UHF readers as that’s an RFID standard.

So this concludes this small case study on a social use of RFID in an exhibition/conference environment.

Oh and they went crazy with segways and smoke machines plus all those LEDs.

And a bit of a tour of the location via dutchcowboys, a dutch marketing and tech blog.

Thanks go to Tom for saving the day (once again!), as 4 people in the team were seriously ill during the crunch period(me included!), so not enough time to test and integrate. Also a big shout out to our collaborators and new special “Internet of Things” operations hit team, Tim and Maarten. All ran smoothly from about 6.30pm onwards. The guests responded very positively!!

My only dark moment was reflecting on the possible extinction of the business card and what that might mean for graphic design on small pieces of card. I was also slightly surprised by how some people used the application. I noticed people in their haste to show it off, clicking on 3 or 4 people they had just met and not really spoken to, pressing the connect button before receiving consent. It was game-like, youthful enthusiasm on show. Treating it as a game when you just meet people was probably due to the nature of the event, which was to show of cool technology. Some people might see this as “connection-lite”, or a new form of spam in which you see your spammer. Shy people will get their email address sent to a stranger who they did not really want to be associated with. Let’s implement that on/off button for RFID tags for people soon.

Team:
Project Management + RFID : Tim and Maarten of Innoviting
Registration web application: Rob van der Burgt – Asva
Roomware Server, database: Tom Burger of Mimic Media, Roomware Project
UI development: Mark Barcinski and Adrien JeanJean of BarcinskiJeanJean
Concept development and creative direction: James Burke of Alchemyst and Roomware Project

 

It’s great to get acknowledged for our project and that we are on to something that means more than just a marketing concept. Yesterday we picked up a major marketing award in the Netherlands, the Spin Awards, which was a triumph of content over spin. Thanks to the jury for realizing the potential of what we have unleashed.

Beste mobiele concept

Goud:
Bureau: Alchemyst i.s.m. The Roomware Project 
Opdrachtgever: Hyves
Titel: Hyves Roomware Gallery

Juryrapport:

De jury is onder de indruk van deze inzending die op alle drie de criteria, effectiviteit, interactie en vooral creativiteit bovenmatig scoort. Om te beginnen is het een oplossing die mensen en hun relaties centraal stelt en in tweede instantie de content. Hiermee spelen de makers heel goed in op de huidige onderstroom in onze samenleving en cultuur. De case geeft de gevoelswaarde van digitale media bij een “event” een krachtige impuls. Een win-win voor organisatoren en vooral voor de bezoeker die meteen in het event worden “gedompeld”, je bent meteen aanwezig en er actief bij betrokken. Een case met veel potentieel in de entertainment industrie en een leverage biedt in het gebruik van LIVE mobile streams vanaf mobile phones in deze entertainment industrie.

 

USA today just posted an interesting article on hotel door security upgrades taking place. Out with the recent, in with the new it would seem.

“Changing technology has hotels looking beyond the traditional plastic key card as a way to unlock guest-room doors.

The Plaza Hotel in New York, now closed for renovation, will open later this year with radio-frequency cards that unlock the door when swiped past the lock at close range. Paper cards, cellphones, fingerprints and iris scans are popping up as alternative unlocking devices.

The plastic cards that decades ago replaced brass keys still dominate. But the alternative devices could gather momentum as lock suppliers show they can deliver better security, lower costs, greater environmental friendliness or a combination.

The standard plastic key card has a magnetic strip encoded at the front desk to unlock a guest-room door. They cost about 10 cents to make and are designed to be used 20 or more nights.

But guests often carry them away or toss them out after one or two nights of stay, says Brian McGuinness, an executive at Starwood Hotels, which has plans to install locks using radio-frequency technology at some of its hotels.

Among the new options:

•Paper card. Charlotte-based Cadmus makes paper keycards used at several independent hotels. Similar to parking stubs, they contain a magnetic strip on the back and can work in the existing locks that take plastic keys.

Paper cards are more environmentally friendly, without being more costly for hotels, says Ray Berger, CEO of Pineapple Hospitality, which markets Cadmus’ keys.

But Mark Goldberg, CEO of Plasticard Locktech International, one of the largest plastic key card manufacturers, says most hotels average about 10 nights per card — not one or two — and that plastic remains the overwhelming favorite among hoteliers because it’s more durable. “We’ve been here 20 years, and we’re confident we’re going to do (plastic) key cards for a long time,” he says.

•Radio-frequency identification (RFID): The Plaza is one of many hotels using or considering RFID, which unlocks doors by verifying information — room number and duration of stay — stored on a chip in the key card.

Aloft and Element, Starwood Hotels’ (HOT) new chains that plan to open their first properties this year, will be built with locks that will initially use traditional key cards but can be converted later to read RFID cards.

The RFID card, which is more expensive to make than the plastic key card, affords greater security because it’s harder to duplicate than a conventional key card, says Marc Freundlich, an executive at Assa Abloy, a hotel lock manufacturer. Based in Sweden, Assa Abloy makes the locks that will be used at the Plaza and the Aloft and Element chains.

Using a cellphone instead of a key

Assa Abloy is working with Accor, operator of Sofitel, Red Roof Inns and other brands, to take the RFID experiment a step further.

The French hotel company recently began testing in two rooms — one each at Hotel Sofitel Le Faubourg and Pullman Paris Bercy (formerly Sofitel Bercy), both in Paris — a new lock that allows guests with advanced models of cellphones or PDAs to flash their device to open the door.

It’s likely to be years before RFID in hotel locks becomes common. Freundlich says he says he knows of no U.S. hotel now using it, though some foreign hotels have already installed it.

•Iris-scan. In 2004, Nine Zero Hotel in Boston, part of the Kimpton chain, installed iris-scan technology in its penthouse suite. When guests check in at the lobby, a hotel employee takes a photo of their iris. Guests open the doors by flashing their iris once again while standing in front of the lock’s iris image reader.

South Korea-based LG, which developed the technology, says the image taken in the lobby involves an auto-focus camera similar to a home camcorder operated in normal indoor lighting.

•Fingerprint. Locks that use fingerprints as the keys have started to emerge. The SoHo Loft, a seven-room hotel in New York, is one of the first customers and has installed it in five of its rooms, owner David Drake says.

Its guests are escorted to their rooms, where their prints are scanned on the lock. Guests can open the doors by pressing their index fingers on the locks and keying in a numerical code issued at check-in. The code is issued as an extra layer of security, Drake says.

For protection of a guest’s privacy, the hotel throws out the scanned fingerprints every few days.

Repeat customers may request that the hotel keep them on file so that they don’t have to repeat the scanning process, Drake says. “I love it because I never have to worry about the keys,” he says.

Todd Morris, CEO of BrickHouse Security, a New York company that installed the hotel’s locks, acknowledges that many customers are concerned about their privacy and are reluctant to render their fingerprints. “The technology is there. The only pushback is that customers are a bit hesitant,” he says.

via USA today

Our goal was to nicely integrate the mobile phone into the user’s “desktop experience” and utilize the current coexistence of PC and mobile phone. Desktop widgets give a nice opportunity to show you relevant information in a polite way while you are using your PC and allow you to use the good UI capabilities of the PC (bigger keyboard and screen) for mobile related features.  

 

Orange has unveiled a gesture based interaction screen that has been produced by a UK agency on their behalf. The agency, known as The Alternative, said it was the first time such a display had been on show to the general public. The purpose of the technology is mainly as an advertising opportunity for Orange, but selecting your favorite music clips have never been so fun. Check out the clip to see what all the fuss is about. 

 

via gizmodo 

This video is more to roll through use cases inside the digital home. Unfortunately it’s a little bit boring. The family is boring and the muzak and quality of production don’t help. Still it’s worth looking through to see the kind of issues and problems that might arise. It’s an older Philips project.

via IFTF

This video really is worth checking out if you want to see how furniture and interaction with screen-based technology and software services are about to arrive near a living room or winebar near you sometime soon. Kudos go to the team at Microsoft for pulling this off.

Included in the demonstration are: – showing how the table links devices to it, enabling easy routes like taking a picture with a bluetooth enabled camera, which immediately appears on surface screen and can then be further manipulated (send to friend, print, etc)
– a wine bar application to help select wine also with a gimmicky wine glass with RFiD or some such id technology so their is retention of object memory even when it is removed from the surface

Following dinner with a new friend working with the open-eyed people at Trendwatching, persuing their site today i came across this RFID-dy/mobile-phone story and had to share it. It’s a funny proof of concept, which somehow befits a fast-food restaurant…(don’t imagine this in a gourmet setting except as a skillfully introduced piece of stagecrafted experience design).

“Working with SK Telecom, McDonald’s in Korea is testing food ordering by RFID (radio-frequency identification). A pilot program in Seoul’s Shinchon neighbourhood lets customers place an order by pointing their cell phone at the items they want. Actually, it’s not quite that simple—they first need to download software to their phone and then, seated at their McDonald’s table, plug an RFID reader into the phone and aim their handset at a menu with built-in RFID chips. Items are automatically charged to their cell phone bill. As soon an order is ready, a message is sent to the customer’s cell phone, letting them know that they can pick up their tray at the counter.

According to SK Telecom, McDonald’s “Touch Order” system is the first in the world that lets customers use RFID to place orders at a restaurant. Like GoMobo, the company that enables members to order food by text message at a growing number of US restaurants, Touch Order allows customers to avoid queues, making the buying process faster and more convenient for both the restaurant and its patrons. One to watch if you’re in mobile commerce or the fast food business! (Related: Food ordering by text message.)

Website: www.mcdonalds.co.kr

Being notified when you food is ready was something i also experienced in the US, earlier this year too. Some sandwich joint gave me a blocky wireless receiver which beeped when my sandwich was ready. Was pretty unexpected, and if only the sandwich were as good as the idea of signaling when the food was ready…..

via springwise