What if you could take a picture of an item from your phone and within seconds find the lowest price? Well, ShopSavvy made an application that would allow people with smartphones to use the phone’s camera as a bar code scanner. A user of this application would simply have to point the camera at an item and ShopSavvy connects to the Web to search for the lowest price, online and local stores, and product review. ShopSavvy also has the feature for retailers to add their emails and their projected price, the company sends out an alert to the retailers when the product hits that price.
There have been reports of ShopSavvy not having the information on all the products out on the market.
A down side to this new application is that it only works best for the G1 which is the Google phone. Other cell phones have fixed focal points which restrict the camera from working properly.
Another product-and-price database is called, Slifter, Virgin Mobile began offering users last month. This program works differently than the other application. It is featured on the phone’s “deck,” a directory of Web sites chosen by the carrier. It should work on more phones because the carrier put them there.
New York Times
“Hesitating Over a Smartphone’s Price? It Could Save You Money”
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/06/technology/personaltech/06smart.html?_r=1&8dpc&oref=slogin
-Monica Sullivan
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2 comments:
My girlfriend has the G1 phone and the app shopsavvy is worth it. Especially since it and every other app on the phone is free! She loves that phone and shopsavy in particular can be useful. whenever we are at the store she pulls it out checking prices to find th best deal.
Rashad L.
Regarding ShopSavvy:
NeoMedia has patents that cover this technology
http://www.neom.com/13.html
Patent #6,651,053 — Interactive system for investigating products on a network
An interactive search system for use with a global computer network, e.g., the Internet, using a search identifying barcode to rapidly and effectively obtain a supply of related information for presentation to a user. A computer, either landline based or mobile, may be used to input a UPC code, taken from a package or advertisement or prestored in the computer, to an implementing server on the network. The server contains a database of product and manufacturer identifying UPC codes and uses the input UPC code and the database to identify the manufacturer and is programmed to then perform a search of the network to locate sites relating to or operated by the manufacturer. Also, the server may search the network on a product basis to locate other sites containing the UPC under search. Using “parsing” technology, the server “pulls out” the product description, transmits it to and places it in a random access memory (RAM) or storage of the computer, and proceeds to perform further searching relying on the product description to uncover relevant information. Accordingly, using a single input, a collection of product-related and manufacturer information is quickly assembled in the computer available for a user’s consideration all at once at any time.
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