NFC - Social Value First Then The Hearts and e-Wallets Will Follow!

Google Nexus S - With NFC Capability

In case you don't know, NFC (Near Field Communication) is a new technology to most of the UK population. Simply put, it is a mobile technology that allows you to do a variety of clever things, just by touching a 'smart tag', another NFC enabled device (like a till, audio speakers) or another NFC mobile phone.

NFC at McDonalds - Are We Lovin It?

So, for example (and this is real-life now), you can go into McDonald's, order a McFlurry and a shake and pay for the whole thing by 'kissing' the payment terminal with your NFC mobile phone. Want to let your Facebook friends know that you've visited a particular restaurant? Just touch the appropriate Smart Tag and the job's done.

Transport for London's NFC Oyster Card

Without realising it, you may already be using NFC. Oyster cards, used so successfully on the London Underground, are astounding examples of this technology's usefulness. Touch the ticket machine to charge it up with your credit card then use it on every turnstile gate on the Tube system - just by touch.

You'd think that, with all the potential uses of NFC, we'd all be using it by now. Why, then, has the long-awaited dawn of near-field communication eluded us thus far, when it is already massively popular elsewhere in the world, particularly in the Far East.

I'm inclined to think that one of the main reasons is that most of the hype about NFC revolves around contactless payments, hoping that we will all pay for everything with our mobile phones, making cash a thing of the past. Whilst I'm an advocate of NFC and want to see this happen, I also believe that it is more likely to happen if non-payment applications of NFC are brought to the fore, so that the person in the street can build up trust in the technology before relying on it to store credit\debit card information.

 Cloud-NFC  has been creating niche applications in the care sector for NFC for the last two years, characterised by two things: simplicity and usefulness. Let me give you a couple of examples of what I mean by this. Suppose someone is living alone at home and has a hearing loss. A caller comes to the door and needs to be interrogated as to their identity. The home owner with the hearing loss is likely to be at a disadvantage, and could be vulnerable prey to a conman posing as a workman in this situation. How can NFC help?

Our solution was to stick a 'smart tag' (an NFC antenna that looks just like a flat label) on the back of the front door, that the home owner can touch with the NFC phone whenever the potential 'bogus caller' situation arises. As soon as it's touched, the system kicks in and sends a pre-coded text message to 4 or 5 trusted neighbours, just to say 'Mr so-and-so at No 12 has an unidentified caller. Can you assist?)

And think about this. Many people, suffering from Alzheimer's disease and dementia, find comfort by being able to interact with things that had meaning for them when they were much younger. Photographs, old post-cards of their town or village, a song from a bygone era all help to reassure them. Care homes very often have 'memory boxes' for their residents to interact with, having a calming, therapeutic effect that brings benefits to the residents and reduces stress on staff. How does NFC figure in this scenario, you might ask?

Well, in more than one case, we trawled the internet to find links to 'past-times video clips', written recollections from years ago, music and voice too - and then associated this 'treasure trove' with an NFC Tag. What this meant was that, for the lady in question - or her carers - she could simply touch the tag with a Google Nexus S phone and have rich media content delivered to her, wherever and whenever she needed it.

The same goes for explaining routine procedures at a hospital to someone who doesn't speak English or requires information in an alternative format, as a result of a sensory loss or a learning disability. By touching a pre-coded NFC Tag with an NFC phone or reader, the patient can access, for example, a full explanation of the MRI scanning procedure - in a language or format that suits him\her.

We love Google because it's simple to use and the stuff it delivers is useful to us in our daily lives. NFC should be no different because it is also simple to use and can deliver huge benefits to all of us in our day to day lives.

So, to all the big guys out there pushing NFC (like Google, Gemalto, Nokia, Lucent Alcatel and Barclaycard etc and contactless payment systems, here's a thought from a fan.) Show people that this amazing technology can be put to uses that will help them take some of the 'grunt' out of life. Once they see the social benefits, their trust, their hearts and their cash will follow.