Your phone is your wallet

 

Today Google introduced Google Wallet—an ‘app that will make your phone your wallet.’

A blurb from the Google blog post describing the service:

You’ll be able to tap, pay and save using your phone and near field communication (NFC) [...] Because Google Wallet is a mobile app, it will do more than a regular wallet ever could. You’ll be able to store your credit cards, offers, loyalty cards and gift cards, but without the bulk. When you tap to pay, your phone will also automatically redeem offers and earn loyalty points for you. Someday, even things like boarding passes, tickets, ID and keys could be stored in Google Wallet.

Initially it will only work with one phone (Nexus S) on one network (Sprint) with one credit card (Citi MasterCard) so it’s a very limited rollout.

I’ve recently read that Apple is working on something similar for the iPhone, and I wonder if Apple’s approach will be compatible with Google’s. Adoption of this technology will take much longer if we begin with competing technical standards and protocols.

I also wonder how much more of my life I want to put in a device that’s capable of tracking my location pretty much 24/7 already—now it’s going to track my spending, too. Not only will Google have a near-monopoly on our search data, but now our financial data to analyze and sell to advertisers as well?

What happens to cash in the next 10-20 years?

Posted: May 26th, 2011
Filed under: Apple, Communication, E-Commerce, Finance, Handheld, Innovation, Mobile Tags: , , , | No Comments »

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