Is it you, or is it me ?

RFID in new zealand passed a new milestone when RFID tags were mentioned on "Shortland Street" - http://tvnz.co.nz/shortland-street-episodes/happened-wednesday-2758512
"TK is disturbed by the strange microchip he finds in Jeff's skin, which he identifies as a pet identification advice. When Jeff reveals his wife is a vet, TK is certain something sinister is going on. " I won't spoil the plot but the RFID tag is not the villan of the piece.

Twitter and RFID

Linking twitter and the real world - http://www.switched.com/2009/04/06/twitter-enabled-cat-door-tweets-a-kittys-comings-and-goings/
a twitter enabled RFID catflap is obviously a bit silly, but this may be one of the solutions to data management for RFID. As H1N1 appears to be becoming pandemic, maybe linking the movement of people and contacts as measured by RFID to twitter is a sensible approach...
More web 2.0 stuff..
also, just playing with the webby winning wordle... I put my PhD abstract through wordle and it looks like: http://www.wordle.net/gallery/wrdl/929516/Phd_Abstrat_-_fuzzy_Ontology

Disclaimer

As always nothing in this BLOG represents AUT policy or a comittment to buy/endorse or marry any one or thing.

RFID on the Skifield

Apparently Whakapapa Skifield (http://www.mtruapehu.com/) in the central north island is introducing RFID -based season tickets. This could help to solve one of the biggest problems I seem to have when skiing - where were we supposed to meet ? As a snowboarder who falls down a lot and isn't as resilient as 20 years ago, I find having a mobile available often means it gets stuck in your ribs. However if the pass itself could alow you to track the locations of your party members then that would be great....

RFID and Kiwifruit

Article in the NZ herald -about the use of RFID in kiwifruit warehouses. A well established application, its particularly interesting as it integrates cameras and RFID technology and puts the readers on the forklifts.
Another bit of commercial news, DHL are running adverts in the economist magazine about using teperature sensing RFID for pharmaceutical cold-chain applications. This seems to be the technology described in this announcement, DHL seems to have blown hot and cold (!) about RFID, but this seems to be now establishes. Also in this weeks economist a lot about health technology and applications of IT and RFID. Maybe President Obama's investment in Health IT will also stimulate demand in this area. IEEE seems to think that the future is bright in that area

belt and braces

I have on my desk the packaging from an electric toothbrush, it has a barcode, RFID and magnetic tag attached to it.
This sort of thing commonly happens when new technology is introduced, older standards continue to be supported at least for a time – look at the introduction of digital TV http://www.digitaltvandradio.co.uk/
. However there is another aspect, that there is actually a complex ecosystem of tagging and that RFID tags do not fulfill the complete needs of businesses in two areas:

1) Uncooperative security ie where the punter might want to take the item from the shop without it being scanned

2) Point access - where the item is only scanned at one point ie checkout.

Its hard to see how current RFID tags can completely fulfill the first role, as essentially disabling them is not difficult and they tend to be larger and harder to conceal. I've noticed that PAK'nSAVE are now putting magnetic anti-theft strips into meat labels, so the unit cost must be relatively low. However a model that trusts the customer as in "self scan" systems may well not need such control and may be more appropriate. The second point is more technical and may require specialist ariel design.

RFID and alzhiemers

As RFID adds information to objects, it has always seemed to be a natural way to assist those with loss of memory. It seems to me a little bit oversold in this article but support for Alzhiemers patients, even if it is just by labeling their clothes is a natural way forward. Tunstall is a major player in the UK assisted living market, and this sort of approach may well add value. In fact it may be that the business model for a lot of these tools may come from the "hotel" and lifestyle side of the market rather than the purely clinical side. Certainly buying new technology that hasn't passed a clinical trial is much easier for individuals or companies than for public health organisations. Maybe this is really consumer-centric healthcare in action.

On an unrelated note, good to see 007 using RFID tagged banknotes to find the rather uninspiring villain in Quantum of Solace. Still waiting for the plotline where the rugged yet fiercly brilliant RFID researcher is the hero...