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Posts Tagged ‘Food Items’

IBM Debuts Food Traceability iPhone App

Today at the IBM Information on Demand event, IBM will demo a new app that will bring the Internet of Things to the iPhone. The as yet unreleased iPhone app is called Breadcrumbs and it will give consumers access to information about grocery food items. The app will be able to scan barcodes and deliver a summary of the ingredients in a food item, along with when it was manufactured. That data is usually on the food label, but Breadcrumbs goes a step further – it can provide extra information such as product recall data. If a product has been recalled in the past, this app will tell the consumer all of the relevant details.

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Breadcrumbs is able to scan barcodes using the iPhone’s camera. The consumer simply points their iPhone at a food item and gets back relevant data. Other than product recall details, the information returned to the user is mostly the same as what’s on food labels – only it is pulled from the Web.

IBM told ReadWriteWeb that when 4G becomes common place in mobile phones, then apps such as Breadcrumbs will become more powerful and be readily used on-the-fly by consumers when grocery shopping.

The larger trend here is the convergence of smart phones with the Internet of Things (i.e. Internet-connected real world objects). Devices such as the iPhone essentially become sensor and RFID readers, which allow consumers to interact with real world objects in a much more detailed manner.

Breadcrumbs is a glimpse of what we’ll see in the near future, when information will literally – finally – be at the consumer’s fingertips when they’re shopping for groceries or any other goods where data is plentiful. Up till now, data such as product recall information has largely been inaccessible to consumers – at least when at the grocery store.

In the long term expect to see apps like Breadcrumb provide data on where and when food items get consumed, together with how long they were on the shelf before being consumed. Apps like Breadcrumbs may even be able to tell who consumed the items (privacy advocates, start your engines!). These apps will also be useful in determining counterfeit items, for example when buying an expensive luxury good.

The date that Breadcrumbs will be launched on iPhone has not yet been announced by IBM.

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Scanning your way to a healthier diet with FoodScanner

Filed under: iPhone, App Store, App Review

Calories do count, and if you are among those who keep track of your daily intake and want an easy way to log what you eat, FoodScanner [iTunes link] may be just the iPhone app for you.

On a trip to the grocery store or just your fridge, FoodScanner reads the bar code and matches it to a large database of food items. If the app is successful in finding a match, you’ll get the product name, amount of calories in a single serving, fat, carbohydrates, and protein content. You can that information to a daily list to keep track of what you are eating, without the pain of doing it all on pencil and paper.

While on a trip to my local Safeway, the bar code recognition worked really well. It just took a second or so to capture the info, and then match it to a database claiming to list over 200,000 food items.

In many cases, the scan returned several items, but it was a simple task to select the correct item by name.

Continue reading Scanning your way to a healthier diet with FoodScanner

TUAWScanning your way to a healthier diet with FoodScanner originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 28 Sep 2009 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Caffeinated apps: Starbucks intros myStarbucks, Starbucks Card Mobile App

Filed under: Software, Odds and ends, iPhone, App Store, iPod touch, First Look, App Review

The Microsoft of the coffee biz, Starbucks, announced this morning that they’ve introduced two new iPhone / iPod touch apps to help customers make the most of their coffee addiction. myStarbucks and the Starbucks Card Mobile App [iTunes links] are free apps available in the iTunes App Store today.

These apps were the subject of much speculation, particularly in the Mac Rumors forums, after Phil Schiller showed the myStarbucks app on the screen at the September 9th, 2009 “It’s Only Rock and Roll” music event.

While the company could have combined the two apps into one monster app, it’s apparent that they’re for two very different purposes. myStarbucks is primarily targeted at finding stores (as if there isn’t one on every street corner in America…) and educating consumers about the drinks and food items available in those stores. The Starbucks Card Mobile App, on the other hand, is pointed towards the professional coffee slurper who already has a Starbucks Card in his or her quivering hand. Let’s look at the two apps in a bit more detail.

myStarbucks starts with a geolocation feature to find the nearest dozen or so Starbucks stores within a few miles of your present location, shown on a map or in a list. If you haven’t had your morning coffee fix and need directions, the app will fire up Google Maps and provide you with driving, transit, or walking instructions. For each “official” Starbucks franchise, there are icons indicating whether or not the store is open, as well as whether or not they have Wi-Fi or oven-warmed food.

Continue reading Caffeinated apps: Starbucks intros myStarbucks, Starbucks Card Mobile App

TUAWCaffeinated apps: Starbucks intros myStarbucks, Starbucks Card Mobile App originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 23 Sep 2009 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Should Consumers Fear The Internet of Things?

So far in this What The Internet of Things Means For You series we’ve looked at how the Internet of Things (when everyday objects are connected to the Web) will affect marketers and accountants. Some of the comments on those posts have requested that we look at the effect on consumers – i.e. all of us. Normally when discussing this topic in relation to consumers, two big issues rear their heads: privacy and security. So we’ll focus specifically on those two issues here.

One of the key aspects of the Internet of Things is the sheer volume of data it will introduce into the Web – and not just any data, but often very personal data.

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Let’s use the oft-quoted example of RFID in grocery stores. When this particular dream (or nightmare, depending on your point of view) becomes a reality, you will be able to do your groceries with the aid of RFID tags on the food items and RFID readers in your mobile phone or credit card. On the plus side, this will make the shopping process more efficient and transparent. For example you can do comparative analysis of food items on the fly. Plus there’ll be no need for check-out, as everything will be automatically recorded against your mobile phone or credit card as you put it in your shopping cart.

The potential ‘dark side’ of this scenario is that at least two players in the retail chain will gather a lot of data about your precise shopping habits: the grocery store and the mobile phone and/or credit card company. Who knows what they will do with that data, right? Also who knows how secure it will be. Our own Dana Oshiro described the RFID chip as "the internet underground’s bubonic plague" in her post about the demise of consumer RFID company Violet this week.

A recent Wired UK article (hat-tip John Simpson for the link) summarized the dangers of this type of scenario:

"How naked will your personal preferences be to advertisers when your entire digital-TV remote-control clickstream is merged with your web-browsing history, your storecard and email data, records of all your movements via face-recognition cameras and radio frequency identification tags, and maps of your mobile phone’s signals? Even if you are determined to resist such data-led manipulation of your deepest desires, how do you know that this vast pool of information will not leak out or be used against your own interests, perhaps by a health insurer or a future employer?"

One person who is actively campaigning against RFID in supermarkets is Katherine Albrecht, who runs a site called CASPIAN (Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion and Numbering). It describes itself as "a national grass-roots consumer group dedicated to fighting supermarket "loyalty" or frequent shopper cards," but RFID is also on its radar.

Albrecht wrote an article in 2002 that warned against the dangers of RFID, which she termed "the worst thing that ever happened to consumer privacy." As is typical with RFID predictions, many of the timelines mentioned in Albrecht’s article have failed to pan out ("these tiny tags, predicted by some to cost less than 1 cent each by 2004…" Yeah right). However the warnings are still relevant, if a little scare-mongering:

"Though many RFID proponents appear focused on inventory and supply chain efficiency, others are developing financial and consumer applications that, if adopted, will have chilling effects on consumers’ ability to escape the oppressive surveillance of manufacturers, retailers, and marketers. Of course, government and law enforcement will be quick to use the technology to keep tabs on citizens, as well."

There’s no evidence to suggest that the effects will be "chilling" or that marketers will be "oppressive," however it’s certainly a good idea for us consumers to be wary about privacy and security issues. You can also read Katherine Albrecht on the spychips website (hat-tip to ReadWriteWeb reader Gene Becker for pointing out Albrecht’s work).

Personally I believe that RFID, and Internet of Things in general (RFID is just an enabling technology), will bring more good than bad. The work of Albrecht and others will help to police retailers and governments, to ensure appropriate privacy and security rules are put in place. But these technologies are coming, whether we like them or not, because they are simply more efficient and offer much more functionality – for consumers, marketers, retailers alike. Let us know your opinion in the comments.

Flickr photo credits: cbmd; Manuel Monroy Correa; Touchatag

See also: Consumer Electronics 2.0: MIT’s Henry Holtzman on The Internet of Things

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RFID: State of the Market

RFID is an emerging standard for identification and tracking of goods. It’s one of the key underlying technologies for the Internet of Things. Yesterday we looked at the market for Internet fridges. Our conclusion was that until RFID tags become more common place on food items, Internet fridges will continue to be novelty appliances. In this post we look at the current state of RFID (Radio-frequency identification).

Some big names in the retail industry have climbed on board the RFID freight train. Notably Wal-Mart, which has not only adopted RFID big time, but pressured its suppliers to do so too.

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The US retail giant issued a mandate to its top 100 suppliers in late 2004, requiring them to use RFID tags. The suppliers struggled to comply, so more Wal-Mart mandates followed. Finally, after years of slow take-up, Wal-Mart introduced fines for non-compliance in January 2008.

The Practical Problems of RFID

As CRM Buyer wrote recently, "while the expectation was that RFID would revolutionize the supply chain from end to end, achieving that transformation was an overly ambitious goal." CRM Buyer pointed to issues such as the cost of tags, problems with reader accuracy, privacy and data integration.

Currently only a handful of Wal-Mart’s nearly 150 distribution centers are RFID-enabled, according to Bob Novack – an associate professor of supply chain management for Penn State. A big part of the problem is that it’s just too hard for suppliers to implement RFID technology. Even at the most basic level of signal interference between RFID chips and things like metal racks. The cost to implement RFID is also a challenge, particularly in a recession.

The CRM Buyer article goes on to state that while RFID may not be finding much success with front-end retail or distribution, it is finding better take up with back-of-the-store inventory and tracking high-value products (e.g. pharmaceuticals, electronics).

Bokodes: Could Compete With RFID in Some Areas

Perhaps the right technology hasn’t yet been found for item identification and tracking. This week MIT announced a new type of bar code, called a bokode. As the BBC reported, bokodes can hold thousands of times more information than bar codes and can be read by a standard mobile phone camera.

Bokodes could replace RFID systems "in some near-field communication applications," suggested MIT Media Lab’s Ankit Mohan. For example, RFID cannot be used for credit cards, because the data can be read at a distance and so isn’t secure enough. Mohan thinks that the Bokode "could encode just as much information, but require an open line-of-sight to the card to be read, increasing security."

While bokodes currently cost about $5 each in their prototype stage, MIT expects the price to drop to about 5 cents when produced in even relatively small volumes.

Conclusion

RFID is almost certainly here to stay, even if other ‘better’ technologies appear. As this deployment map from the RFID Journal shows, the technology is getting solid take-up, even despite the practical difficulties. Tech companies such as IBM are also using RFID extensively. However, RFID is still a long way off replacing bar codes.

As far as consumer applications for RFID go, don’t hold your breath. Tim Berners-Lee was excited by the possibilities of RFID chips, for example enabling people to check information about individual products on the Web. Before we can do that kind of thing though, retailers and suppliers need to overcome many hurdles to even implement the baseline RFID technology.

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