Tikitag connects offline devices to online data

SAN DIEGO--Tikitag, an Alcatel-Lucent venture, demonstrated a new product at DemoFall that enables people to use RFID wireless technology to link any type of offline device or paper with information online.

Companies can put tikitags, small tags that stick onto things like Post-Its, which contain data, onto products or business cards. Tikitag readers can read the data off the items and provide additional information and services online.

For instance, someone can put all their social network and identity information onto a tikitag and affix that to their business card that can display that information on the Internet when swiped over a tikitag reader. Tikitags can be applied to toys and other products so people can get more information about the products online. And cell phones can be used to grab data off a tikitag affixed to a poster to get more information and buy tickets for events.

The service will go into public beta October 1 and it will be available on Amazon for $49.95.

[paulmwatson]

I have to pay $49.95 for a reader that reads tikitags? And all my friends and any customer I want using a tikitag has to pay $49.95? Ouch.

[tikhans]

@ paulmwatson - our readers are standards compliant and most NFC mobile phones also work with the tikitag service. By the way $49,95 is a pretty low price for this kind of hardware. plus you get to be part of a community that creates and shares applications. So I'm not so sure about the ouch...

tikihans (tikitag)

[yaaqi]

Didn't this idea fail with the CueCat, nearly a decade ago? How is this idea different?

Seems like just another case of a solution to a problem that doesn't exist... unless the problem is "we want to advertise to you more easily", in which case the consumers certainly aren't going to pay $49.95 for the "privilege" of viewing ads!

[sayhong999]

Tikhans, I agree with yaaqi and paulwatson. Perhaps you may want to demonstrate usable apps for the Tikitags to get buy-in from possible users?

[tikhans]

Guys, I see your point, but the core of tikitag is the community. We don't want to impose ways to use tikitag, we just want to enable people to go and have fun with tags. So we don't know what people want to do with it yet. The apps that are online now is what we have implemented to demo. A lot more is possible and we are eager to see what people will come up with. And by the way we are targeting web-savvy users and DIY coders in the first place. What may seem useless to some people, might interest these guys who just want to play around with it. And on the advertising part, true, you can use it for advertising, as we also demoed but this is based on a pull-marketing model. You as a consumer can decide whether or not you want to receive info etc. by touching or not touching. And this, in my opinion, is the least intrusive way of advertising. So I don't see what's wrong with that.
Nevertheless, thanks for all your comments - it surely gives us stuff to think/talk about.

[Motoma]

Seems a lot like the Semacode thing that never took off either.

[KimuraKalidor]

I have three comments on this.
1) 50 bucks for a reader sounds pretty good. It's would make a cheap interim solution for inventory with a small business because sticking tags inside the case sure would save time. No one like to inventory their equipment and anything to get it done quicker is an amazing thing.

2) As far as the comment on semacode. The smartpox / Semacode / QR thing may not have taken off in the states, but certainly they are in adds all over europe and asia, and I am starting to see them more in Canada and in some parts of the states. Certainly I've had a few business cards from New York and San Fran with QR codes and I can say that it works a lot faster and better then the OCR for business cards on my cellphone. I also don't forget to get people into my outlook, or stores into my shopping list when I have a QR code quick and present.

3) A lot of people may say this is an answer to a question that was never asked. I will say that is a very regional centric view that comes from a lot of people not knowing the right questions to ask because they simply cannot see past the limited scope they currently live in, and in five years time when they catch up with the more tech savvy part of the world they will see the benefits.