Google’s IRL “Places” tech – a radio-tagged sticker that you can scan with a compatible phone for venue deals and info – is spreading. And that’s a great thing! The big push is hitting Austin, Portland, Las Vegas, Madison, and Charlotte, North Carolina.
With Visa and ANZ announcing their four week trial of NFC mobile phone payments this week, it seems that the time is ripe for contactless payments through phones to take off. And according to Director of Innovation at Visa in Australia, Ben Pfisterer, the time for mobile payments may be even sooner than we expect.
British newspaper The Independent has heard from various sources at UK networks that Apple’s next iPhone won’t have NFC, as the rumours have suggested recently. If true, that’d certainly put a dampener on paying-by-swiping taking off this year.
Having just been updated to version 3.0, Foursquare has revealed that the app can now check-in users via NFC. While there aren’t many phones out with inbuilt NFC at the moment, the blue badge check-in points are going to really help businesses lure customers in in the future. [NFC World via SlashGear]
The big three US carriers have gotten their mobile payment Voltron on, creating ISIS – a new service that will let you use your phone as you would a credit or debit card for purchases. But that’s just the start.
