Technology Business Report

Is RFID Dead?

Last month, HP announced a new tiny chip -- dubbed "Memory Spot" -- that can be attached to nearly any object, making content available across a wide range of commercial and consumer products. Sounds a bit like RFID? You've got it. So what's the big deal?

What makes the Memory Spot is size. Not just the physical size of the chip, which is considerably smaller than a typical RFID. The chip incorporates a processor, memory and a wireless receiver, all bundled together in a device 2-4 mm². Memory Spot has small physical dimensions, but more importantly, it has greater memory capacity and data access speed. And, becuase the tiny chip can be attached to or embedded in almost any object, resulting products could be exponentially more compelling than RFID-attached units.

The research done to design and build the chip was done in Hewlett-Packard's laborotory in Bristol.

Hewlett-Packard says that the chip is so small that it can be built into almost any object, and have proposed several possible uses. These include, but are not limited to:

Ensuring that drugs have not been counterfeited
Tagging patients' wristbands in hospitals
Adding multimedia to postcards
Incorporation into books

HP claims that once the units are in mass-production, they may cost as little as one dollar each.
No batteries are needed because the chips get their power by induction from the devices which read the data.

Current wireless transfer speeds are 10 Mbit/s.

The current development version of the chip can hold 512 kB of data; but HP say that the memory capacity is likely to increase in the future. They claim that they are two years away from commercial production.

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References

Some examples are:

* Medical records: Embed a Memory Spot chip into a hospital patient’s wrist band and full medical and drug records can be kept securely available.
* Audio photo: Attach a chip to the prints of photographs and add music, commentary or ambient sound to enhance the enjoyment of viewing photos.
* Digital postcards: Send a traditional holiday postcard to family and friends with a chip containing digital pictures of a vacation, plus sounds and even video clips.
* Document notes: A Memory Spot chip attached to a paper document can include a history of all the corrections and additions made to the text, as well as voice notes and graphical images.
* Perfect photocopies: A Memory Spot chip attached to a cover sheet eliminates the need to copy the original document. Just read the perfect digital version into the photocopier and the result will be sharp output every time, no matter how many copies are needed, and avoiding any possibility of the originals jamming in the feeder.
* Security passes: Add a chip to an identity card or security pass for the best of both worlds --- a handy card with secure, relevant digital information included.
* Anti-counterfeit tags: Counterfeit drugs are a significant problem globally. Memory Spot chips can contain secure information about the manufacture and quality of pharmaceuticals. When added to a drug container, this can prove their authenticity. A similar process could be used to verify high-value engineering and aviation components.

Will Google Save TV?

Google CEO Eric Schmidt would have us believes that television viewers should not have to stand for TV commercials that are "a waste of your time." According to Schmidt, "when you watch the television you see ads that are clearly not targeted for you."

Apparently, Mr. Schmidt has not heard of Tivo or the other half-dozen time-shifting technologies available for the tube. Or perhaps he does own DVR of his own. And, perhaps he is equally aware that the TV sales industry is under great pressure to convince advertisers that those big dollars are well-spent.

The plan according to Schmidt is to deliver "targeted measurable television ads." Read: AdWords for TV. But what's the real plan? Targeting is relatively clear, but what about measurability. After all, when most of watch TV, we don't click on a sponsored link to activate an ad.

Will the TV execs willingly convert their impression-based platform to something genuinely measurable? Not with $74 billion in ad revenue at stake.

So, how will Google measure ads on TV? Chances are, they will do it very slowly. Traditional broadcast, whether radio or TV is not an easy industry to disrupt. It's not as though you can just build a killer search algorithm. Radio and TV are massively operations-oriented with layers of corporations, high-paid executives and union personnel.

If you think Google's foray in to TV will be quick, take a close look at the dMarc acquisition, which is Google's entree in to the world of radio, and you will see that traditional media is a much tougher nut to crack. dMarc is a mature company with a diverse product set designed to aid radio station operations from the bottom up. Google will have to have build and/or acquire a complex and robust platform, if it intends to get close to the ad placement on your TV.

This may be Google's toughest challenge, yet. To date, it has bought and built relatively thin applications -- certainly nothing that an entire industry would truly rely upon and expect business continuity.

Although it may be part of the plan, getting in to this business will not be as simple as buying TiVo for a billion dollars or YouTube for $2 billion. To be successful, Google will need to get deep in the thick of TV operations. Good news, if you Crispin Corporation, Fighting Bull or one of the industry automation solutions providers.

Save the Internet: Call a Senator

Below is a reprint from a recent Save the Internet email. If you believe that Net Neutrality is important please read on and call a Senator or two...

Dear Save the Internet member:

Here's the latest from the Senate Commerce Committee, where a "mark-up" on several amendments to Senator Stevens' Telecom Act began today at 10 a.m.: The Snowe-Dorgan Net Neutrality amendment will probably come before the Committee by mid-to-late afternoon. If successfully passed, the amendment would put Net Neutrality language into the massive Telecommunications Act. This is critical.

If your (or your readers'/members') Senators sit on the committee, they need to hear from you immediately. Ask them to support the Snowe-Dorgan Net Neutrality amendment to the larger Telecom Act (S. 2686).

Here are the members of the committee who have not taken a strong position in favor of Internet freedom and for the Snowe-Dorgan Amendment. Please urge your members to call them now:

Chairman Ted Stevens (R-Alaska)
Phone: 202-224-3004

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.)
Phone: 202-224-2235

Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.)
Phone: 202-224-2353

Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.)
Phone: 202-224-5274

Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.)
Phone: 202 224 3224

Sen. David Vitter (R-La.)
Phone: 202 224-4623

Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.)
Phone: 202-224-6253

Sen. Conrad Burns (R-Mont.)
Phone: 202-224-2644

Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.)
Phone: 202-224-6551

Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.)
Phone: 202-224-6244

Sen. John E. Sununu (R-N.H.)
Phone: 202-224-2841

Sen. Gordon Smith (R-Ore.)
Phone: 202-224-3753

Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.)
Phone: 202 224-6121

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas)
Phone: 202-224-5922

Sen. George Allen (R-Va.)
Phone: 202-224-4024

Sen. John D. Rockefeller (D-W.Va.)
Phone: 202-224-6472

These phone calls actually make a difference.

Thank you for your good work on behalf of this campaign.

Tim Karr
Campaign Director
Free Press

P.S. Here are some recent articles and videos in support of SavetheInternet and Net Neutrality:

An Internet for the Few or the Many?
Michael Copps has a message for the technology industry when it comes to Net neutrality: Get involved.
CNet News.com

Don't Let the Service Providers Discriminate on the Internet
Two of the Internet's top business innovators made a case for Net Neutrality today in an op-ed written for the San Jose Mercury News. "Reinstating the Internet's core principle of net neutrality won't stand in the way of innovation," write John Doerr and Reed Hastings. "Indeed, net neutrality has, until recently, been the very foundation of Internet innovation."
San Jose Mercury News

Protecting Net Neutrality from the Neutricidal Telcos
For AT&T and Verizon to be screaming for the protection of the free market against Net Neutrality is "sheer hypocrisy," writes Internet guru Cory Doctorow. "They themselves are creatures of government regulation, basing their business on government-granted extraordinary privileges."
Information Week

No Tolls on the Internet
Only a Congress besieged by high-priced telecom lobbyists could possibly consider handing the Internet over to the handful of cable and telephone companies that control online access for 98 percent of the broadband market.
Washington Post

Also, check out these recent "Videos from the People:"
http://www.savetheinternet.com/blog/2006/06/26/videos-from-the-people/