Comments on: Poken: the perfect gift for anti-social gits

By: Jon Allen

Jon Allen — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 13:00:17 +0000

correction. It’s not an infra-red link, but a proprietary low freq RF link. They are going to provide an API very soon. Yes it does work on Linux.
Their business model is “viral marketing”. They get their customers to sell it to their friends.
It seems to be working, I bought a pack of 12 and have already sold 5 with 3 more reserved.

The technology to exchange details already exists between phones, but who do you ever see do it? It’s always too difficult and requires setup and compatability.
The iPhone has how many different apps to be able to exchange e-details, but they have not taken off so far.
With poken you just touch them together, no technology knowledge required.

By: Jon Allen

Jon Allen — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 03:35:46 +0000

regarding the Poken details : I doubt it’s any kind of standard yet.
It’s infrared link sitting on what is basically a very small USB device. You plug the USB link into your computer ( works with MAC and PC . I don’t know about limux)
and connect to their website.
You control what is shown to contacts on your electronic calling card via the website. You can personalise your e-busines card up to a certain degree.
You can add a number of links , your photo and a background.

By: Ken Y-N

Ken Y-N — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 14:48:49 +0000

If I win one from Nick’s competition I’ll have one…

By: Robert Sanzalone

Robert Sanzalone — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 13:58:33 +0000

We’re working hard to put together a Poken Event soon here in Nagoya.

Quick question: Do YOU Poken yet Ken?

Cheers.

By: Ken Y-N

Ken Y-N — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 14:53:02 +0000

Nick, I’m certainly not interesting in winning if you will be pre-frotting the Poken!

tudza, I don’t know the details of how they work, but if they are RFID-based it would be very, very nice if there was mobile phone interface, especially for Japan where a lot of people use their mobiles as their primary internet device. However, then you could argue “why bother with the Poken in the first place?” I don’t know how open their system is, but with personal calling cards if you could stick your Poken ID/home URL in a QR code… However, I don’t know the Poken business model – is the main business hardware or account activity?

By: tudza

tudza — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 21:32:20 +0000

I take the title to mean a Poken is a way for someone who is not social to become more social since they will now have a more convenient way to gather contact information.

Couple comments:

1) Personal calling cards

2) Do they have cell phone/pda applications that talk the same protocol?

3) Is it a standard protocol, like VSF or something?

By: Nick Ramsay

Nick Ramsay — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 15:52:30 +0000

On the off-chance that you have any readers from the Chubu area here, plans for a Poken meet-up in Nagoya are on the drawing board, so please contact me directly or keep an eye on JapanSoc.org for updates. Ken, I’ll consider this your entry and hope you win! It might encourage you to make a trip up my way for some Poken frottage!

By: Jamaipanese

Jamaipanese — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 15:40:06 +0000

anti-social? -_-

I want one, I will enter the Japansoc contest. Hope I win ^^