I know there are technologies to friend-locate via GPS coordinates between two or more enabled cell phones. But has anyone transferred that to a phone/car pairing?

Two scenarios:

1. You have a GPS unit in the car (built-in or aftermarket) and GPS on your phone. You “pair” them once (perhaps via Bluetooth exchange), and from then on, as you leave a mall or stadium you launch the CarFinder application. CarFinder shows you a single button: find my car now. (Obviously there can be options, such as finding a previously bookmarked place, or finding another paired car — say, your spouse’s.)

The system requests the satellite system to ping your car once for its location, then correlates that with the GPS data being provided by your phone. Your results — ideally overlayed on an accurate map — are then displayed, together with the option of starting direction-giving. Since GPS provides altitude date, too, it could tell you if you’re too low or high (on the wrong floor) of a parking complex.

2. Same program concept, but if your car isn’t GPS enabled, your cell phone handles both ends of the calculation. For this, you have to remember to activate “Remember this location” before leaving the vicinity of your car. (If the car has been towed, this will be less effective than the first option!, in addition to the extra user burden of having to activate the system when parking.)

Seems like a relatively small but very fabulously useful application. I’ve seen people take a picture of their parking area to refer to later. Does CarFinder already exist? It should.

Palm Centro devices, left, and Texas Instruments’ Speak&Spell, right.

Notice the resemblance? 29 years apart: 1978 and 2007

Great catch, Phil! E.T. would have had a much easier time of it on a Centro, though. Pity he couldn’t wait around for 30 years.

[via Concept to Consumer]

Talk about a great interface. Scribbles is a drawing application for Macintosh. The design of the interface is so much more than just a pretty skin: the brilliant colors and inviting feel are so appealing that it makes you want to use it, and there is nothing there that isn’t 100% function.

The look is as clean and clear as can be. Is there full control over every feature, as in Illustrator or Freehand? Of course not. But you can open Scribbles and start scribbling. My kids are loving it, and I can hardly keep my hands off it.

If you’ve spent substantial time with another illustration program, you’ll be impressed by the infinite (or seemingly so) zoom, the beautiful handling of layers, and the unlimited canvas size.

The site is as gorgeous as the application; unlimited free trial and low registration fee make it even sweeter.

MomsRising.org has created a great-sounding SMS-based service to help you avoid toxic toys while you’re shopping:

Send a SMS/text message to 41411 with the text, “healthytoys [search term/toy name]” — where [search term] is the name of a toy, type of toy, manufacturer, or retailer. This will let you know if a toy contains toxic chemicals or not.

Example: Text “healthytoys alphabet pal” to 41411 to find out the toxics rating for the Alphabet Pal by Leap Frog, sold at Walmart. You can also search by retailer (text “healthytoys walmart” to 41411) or manufacturer (text “healthytoys leap frog” to 41411).

We’ll respond instantly with the results, based on recent comprehensive tests by HealthyToys.com. The results will indicate whether the toy or product had a low, medium, or high detection of toxic chemicals.

Finnish vendor Nokia announced an extension of its mobile music platform on Tuesday, with the unveiling of a subscription service that allows users to keep their music.

At its annual investor day in the Netherlands, Nokia announced its ‘Comes With Music’ platform, that enables people to buy a Nokia device with a year of unlimited access to millions of tracks.

Once the year is complete, customers can keep all their music without having to worry about it disappearing when their subscription is over. [see telecoms.com for the full story]

This is very similar to Nokia’s purchase and inclusion of mapping software on high-end devices (something we discussed in the Mobile Marketing panel at the MoMo Summit). The buzz is that “it’s all about content” — that future revenues are going to be driven primarily by content.

Take a look at how Apple’s iTunes fits into its strategy: revenues are huge at 36%, but the importance is in the content’s role in driving sales of the iPod and computer hardware lines. That lesson hasn’t been lost on others. Think Amazon and Kindle, Nokia and Ovi, Sony and their upcoming revamped music store.

But is the buzz true as a trend?

What do these activities say about company strategy? Where are these players expecting their future revenues growth to come from?

1. Hardware sales? The device is the money maker, with higher prices/differentiation justified by including free content — sales of devices driven by consumer desire for the “free” (or premium) content included; or
2. Content sales? The hardware is a one-off sale, but the ongoing revenues from online content and subscription sales are the real money-maker; or
3. Something else entirely?

It’s clear that the future of computing in general — the big future — is in mobile. Desktop computers, home media centers, and laptops will be nice CE moneymaking appliances, like microwaves and large-screen TVs. Sure, they’re more necessary than luxuries like designer espresso machines, but you can live without them, for example, if you are struggling to pay off student loans.

Mobiles will be like refrigerators or washing machines. You just can’t manage without them. That’s already true now, but at the moment it’s more of a psychological need to not miss anything. As mobile email improves, flat data plans roll out, web browsing becomes usable, phone memory grows to accommodate video and audio entertainment realistically, downloading becomes easier rather than sideloading… as those things happen, the mobile device will be completely embedded as the primary computing device in fact, not just in theory. As the N95 ads say, “it’s what the computer has become” and it’s true (but not of the N95, I’m afraid).

The “content driving sales of content” model: Amazon’s Kindle appears to seek its profits not on device sales, but on opening the market to ebook sales. Is this how they intend to compete with Google’s devaluing of books… by making books affordable through non-printing? Cutting out of the loop the paper, the printing, the ink, the distributor, the store? Making it palatable by including the cellular connection? (Worthy of note: O’Reilly Radar)

The “content driving sales of hardware” model: This appears to be Nokia’s: rolling the cost of the content into the hardware, and keeping the content free by owning it themselves and amortizing the cost over tens of millions of hardware units.

The “content driving sales of advertising” model: Google. The evolution of the tried-and-true broadcast television model. It certainly works for Google. Will we see the day when Google struggles to maintain its advertising value as broadcast networks have? Surely a company is incubating somewhere that will eventually grow to challenge Google’s dominance… then what?

The “hardware driving sales of hardware AND content” model: Although you might argue that people purchase iPods because they want to use iTunes Music Store for price and ease of use… I wouldn’t buy that argument. I would believe that after the hardware sale, the content is a huge follow-on market.

If Nokia is trying to emulate Apple’s model, why are they including all this free content? It erodes the follow-on possibilities. On the other hand, follow-on content sales for mobile devices have been anemic all along (ringtones, music, video, mapping, whatever). So… is Nokia taking for granted that follow-on sales are not that valuable for some reason on this platform? Or are they betting that by getting people to use the content, later on (say, in two years) they’ll be unwilling to give it up, and will pay for subscriptions, and that that will be worthwhile?

I’m not a believer in educating the market. You see, once people become accustomed to not paying for content (eg, television programming), it’s hard to get them to pay for that same delivery later on. What you CAN get people to pay for is previously free content in a more convenient delivery (think buying a song via iTunes for “only” $0.99 rather than hassling to load a CD that’s down in the basement).

What do these models all have in common? With the exception possibly of Apple’s hardware business*, everyone is trying to figure out how to harness desire for content as a driver for sales of whatever it is they sell. Or how to change what they sell in order to make it driveable by content desire.

Why does content desire matter so much? Content is what you experience when you use the device. It is what brings you back again and again to use the device — you want to talk to someone, you reach for the phone. You want to hear a song — you reach for the iPod. You want to watch a movie — you reach for the TV remote. Only now, you can just reach for the mobile phone to do any of those things. It’s the mobile-able content that matters most, because it’s wherever you are.

* You could make a decent case that Apple’s “hardware” sales are actually sales of experience: combined hardware and operating system. Consumers pay more for Apple’s products not because they are beautiful, although they are, but because they want the usable, beautiful, stable operating system and applications. Which are themselves content, in a way.

Here’s a short video clip showing a child-friendly train car in Tokyo. It’s too good to be true, especially in a country where pressure to keep public areas quiet — including train cars — is tremendous.

For me, the most striking things about Tokyo were its silence and its cleanliness. It is all the more noticeable when you come from Israel, where, sadly, love of the land is not always demonstrated by litter control.

In Tokyo, a city of over 12,000,000 residents (not counting workers who come in daily), I saw one — ONE — piece of litter in the street during a 10-day visit. And that was an empty beer can blowing down the street in a typhoon. It’s refreshing and remarkable, although I’m sure there’s a price to pay, as there is in any very clean environment.

[Amusing: en route to a meeting, we collected a granola bar wrapper which we had to carry for 15 minutes through Tokyo Station before finding a trash bin. So very, very clean, and yet so few places to dispose of litter!]

More great pictures of the children’s train at Deputy Dog.

It was with a pleasant start that I received my change, including a shiny new 2 shekel coin (my first). Sized between a 1 NIS and a 5 NIS coin, its value is about 50 cents, which is a very practical amount. Since I came to Israel, the 5 and 10 NIS bills have been phased out to be replaced by coins; also gone is the 1 agora coin (worth about 0.25 U.S. cents), with the 5 agora coin (1.25 U.S. cents) scheduled for obselescence next year.

I do foresee that this new coin will take some adjusting  to both mentally (to quickly identify the coin my wallet) and practically (not to make payment mistakes). Actually, considering the question, I think that this 2 NIS coin is going to be a problem for a while. The 1 and 5 NIS coins are so far apart in size that I never would confuse them, despite their sharing a color. But this nice new 2 NIS coin is too close to both of those, and will require a lot more attention to identify. The Bank of Israel claims that the size was a deliberate decision, meant to convey the coins value between 1 and 5 NIS. Oh, well. Remember the Susan B. Anthony dollar? It was always getting confused with a quarter… and died a silent death. I haven’t seen too many Sacagawea coins around, either.

*There’s a word I don’t have much opportunity to use, so please excuse the indulgence.

Noted last night in real time on my Blackberry

Sitting inside the plate glass window of a cafe. Two men come in, one younger, maybe 25, and one older, about 45. They order coffee (”Latte?” “What do you mean latte? I want real coffee”) and take it to an outdoor table to drink.

20 minutes later

Two police officers, long guns slung over their shoulders, approach them. Subconsciously, I assume they know each other, this policeman and this older member of the coffee drinkers, and are having a chat.

Eventually, my eye is caught by the body language being projected through the storefront window beside which I sit. They are standing there too long, they are not smiling. The men at the table grow more serious. Another man is waved forward; he is accusing them of something. The police ask for an explanation. The two at the table are shaking their heads, making controlled little hand gestures; they are denying something. They are amused, then taken aback, then angry. The third man is drawn aside by the tall policeman. He is wearing a red hard hat, and lights up a cigarette. The younger man keeps talking to the policewoman, pointing at his cup of coffee emphatically. He seems to be saying that he has been here, drinking coffee, the whole time. He gets more agitated. The older man (his father? No — the relationship doesn’t fit. Maybe an uncle?) keeps trying to hold him back, calm him down. He gets up yelling. The policeman (and he is really big) starts to close in tighter. He’s in the young man’s personal space. He exudes menace. He’s got out handcuffs now. They walk the young man away, but he’s getting worked up again. He’s offended and angry. He’s wrestled to the ground, on his knees, his head pressed down low, handcuffed, hoisted back to his feet. The uncle (?) stands right next to them, looking helpless, and afraid to interfere any more.

Without hearing a word, I admit, I don’t think the police needed to be so aggressive. The young guy was so obviously upset, but also not about to jump on anyone. It was almost as if they were looking for him to get angry enough to justify physical restraint tactics. My sense is that if they had asked him to come with them for questioning, he would have.

Who were these people? The accuser in the red hard hat, still quietly smoking his cigarette? The slight policewoman, ducking behind her partner? The religious and supportive but impotent uncle? The open-looking young man with contradictory clothing? The intimidating officer?

What are their stories? What chapter are they writing at this moment?

30 minutes later

Sequel: The “uncle” just came back… to pay for the two cups of coffee. Mi keAmcha Yisrael. His honesty inspires. Perhaps they are at the police station just two blocks away?

Was he trying to help out his young friend without realizing what he was up to? Was he in the dark completely — maybe the young man was in a hit-and-run on his way over? Was the whole thing a mistake? I’ll never know.

I watch him walk away in the rain.

The picture? Their table, as they left it. Never did get a chance to finish the coffee. 

The elevator panel at Ben Gurion airport, Tel Aviv:

3rd floor, Departures

2nd floor, Public Transport

1st floor, Orchard

Ground floor, Arrivals

Every airport should have an orchard, don’t you think?

Seen in a Helsinki hotel:

“Vegetal Base Soap”. I was surprised that this was important enough to bother shaping into the soap bar, although the effect is nice. Are many soaps still animal-based? If I were philosophically vegetarian, would this concern me in a hotel? What would I use if the soap had not been marked? Shampoo? Would I remain loyal to the hotel because of its consciousness, as demonstrated by the choice of vegetal soap? Is the green color (very unnatural for soap) meant to signal concern for the earth and its inhabitants?

Note: the plastic wrapper on the soap was so hard to remove that the housekeeping staff had left the package partially cut open.