Telstra has revealed the addition of almost one million new mobile services in the six months to December 2011, but Sensis revenues plummeted 24 percent in 12 months.
It sounds like something out of science fiction, but Nokia says it is well on the way to developing technology that will enable a user of today's cellphones to photograph an object and get instant information from the Internet: for example snapping a movie poster and getting instant access to a downloaded trailer.
Nokia calls the technology 'Point&Find'. The camera phone recognises images and uses a combination of these and GPS location data to link the user directly to content or services on the web that have been pre-linked to that image or object. "The result is immediate access to the information required. Point the camera phone at a poster for a new movie to watch the trailer, buy tickets, find screening times or read reviews, or point the phone at a famous landmark to be put in touch with historical and architectural details or tourist information."
It claims that the technology is able to distinguish objects – indoors and outdoors and even when they are very small or are moved from an original location – without the need for barcodes, RFID (radio-frequency identification) or other physical identifiers. 'Point&Find' was initially developed by Pixto, a Silicon-Valley start-up acquired by Nokia in April 2007 and integrated into Nokia Research Centre.
Nokia says that Point&Find will work on existing camera phones, without needing hardware upgrades and does not require costly infrastructure modifications. However it has given no indication of when it might become a commercial reality.
For providers of content and services across the Internet, the promise of the service lies in its speed of delivery and its simplicity. "While capturing the image of an object is something every camera phone user knows how to do, 'Point&Find' is able to use this image to take people instantly to the content they want, with one – or maybe zero – further clicks."
"The benefits offered to content providers and developers by Point&Find are great, because they capitalise on the immediacy of the situation. Bored on a train, a traveller sees a photo of a beautiful island in an advertising poster. Later, once home, the image is already forgotten. But 'Point&Find' can instantly link our traveller – and potential visitor – with information about the destination, from tourist notes to special offers on flights, accommodation and excursions.
Nokia claims that browsing the Internet for information from a mobile device is frustratingly slow and likely to see most users give up before reaching the information they want. " Research shows that, with every click, a typical content provider loses an astonishing 50 percent of users...Today, around six out of every ten pages on web portals take over half a minute to download...While these figures are gloomy enough, the picture is still worse for mobile Internet. If half a minute has you tapping your fingers with impatience in the comfort of an office or living room, imagine how much longer it would feel loitering outside a restaurant for a review to download before deciding to take a table."
David Bass
| For the fourth year in a row, IDC has placed content security provider Websense (NASDAQ: WBSN) at the top of the IDC Worldwide Web Security 2011 –…
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