Business cards work because most everyone has them. And if they don’t, it doesn’t matter: the transaction still works with a single card. Electronic business cards, like Poken, do not work. And they never will until everybody you want to swap details with is using the exact same application or widget.
But that isn’t stopping Poken from trying. The Poken itself is a little USB keychain in the shape of a “cute” character, with a large, fold-out hand. To exchange details, each Pokenator (we made that word up) must flip open the hand and then touch it to the other Poken in an annoying this-is-what-the-hip-kids-are-all-doing high-five.
Once precious bodily fluids have been successfully intermingled via RF, a light will flash green and you can promiscuously move on to the next hot thing in the room, for up to 50 different people. Once back at the computer, you can plug in and enjoy all the new contact details, as well as profiles for most social networking sites.
There are two main Poken models, the Spark and the Pulse. The $20 Spark is Poken-only, and the $35 Pulse also has 2GB of flash memory. Both, we predict, are doomed to failure, although the Poken FAQ does address the problem of critical mass: The entry points out that no cellphone based interchange has worked because they are unwieldy, or don’t work cross platform. We’d agree, and add that for this to even begin to work, the device and software should be ubiquitous.
So we present our solution. Apple should build this in to the contacts app of the iPhone and iPod Touch. So many people already have these that the tipping point has already been reached. But that software has to be already there, baked in, and not even a free download from the app store.
Poken Beta [Poken. Thanks, Alan!]
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