The streets of Ginza are tapped with over a thousand tiny RFID chips that are a part of the Tokyo Ubiquitous Technology Project, a billon-yen experiment by the Japanese government to see how helpful it is to tourists, the elderly, the disabled, and other disoriented people to have location and resource information continuously streamed into their consciousness via an iPod-like portable device. Every time someone walks by a tagged location, the device picks up its signal and brings audio and video reports of, say, the Apple store's newest featured items or the history of the Mitsukoshi department store. It also provides maps and directions.
The project is in an experimental stage right now, but it's available 4 languages, and similar infrastructure may end up stateside soon. (According to the Japan Times, some US cities are already showing interest.)
I can see how that's really useful and very cool, but somehow I just think that if countries invested the same amount of money into disease research or things like that, we'd be a lot better off, health-wise. Think of the millions of dollars it would take to do the same thing for New York City or Chicago. Now imagine putting that towards cancer or AIDS research.
Posted by: mq1986 | March 08, 2007 at 09:55 AM