Following is the article from the New York Times:


At Checkout, More Ways to Avoid Cash or Plastic

By CLAIRE CAIN MILLER - NYT

November 15, 2009


For almost as long as Americans have been hearing about jetpacks and
picturephones, they have been hearing that money -- bills, coins and plastic
cards -- might cease to exist, or at least become a novelty.

Instead of leather wallets, consumers could, sooner than they think, carry
virtual wallets, with their credit card and bank information stored on
remote computers that are accessible everywhere and anytime. They could use
them whenever they want to buy something, whether on the Web, on cellphones
or at cash registers.

With a new cellphone application called ShopSavvy, for instance, a shopper
can use the phone's camera to scan an item's bar code in a store to see if
it is available for less online. If so, the shopper can buy it with one
click if they have already entered their credit card and shipping
information on PayPal's Web site.

"What we're trying to do and what we think is very important is to displace
the use of cash or checks," said Scott Thompson, president of PayPal, which
is a leader in digitizing money. "We'll just have one wallet, and it lives
in the cloud."

PayPal says its service makes the checkout process more convenient and
secure for both shoppers and merchants.

The way consumers pay for things has transformed only a few times. Coins
replaced bartering, paper bills mostly replaced coins, and bank drafts and
checks developed as an alternative to cash.

In the 1950s, the credit card was introduced, and today, Americans pay for
more on plastic than they do in cash. Some airlines and restaurants, for
instance, no longer accept cash. The coming evolution to digital money that
is handled over the Web is under way, led by companies like PayPal,
MasterCard and Visa, as well as start-up companies and retailers. Some
methods involve using a cellphone instead of a credit card, while others
call for using a single password or code to tap into their credit cards.

"It just keeps getting more and more convenient to get access to your money
and to transfer it to someone else," said Lawrence H. White, a professor of
economics at George Mason University who specializes in the history of
money. "When everyone has a cellphone, why reach into your wallet?"

Digital money has been promised for well over a decade. During the dot-com
bubble, several companies tried and failed to come up with Web-based cash
alternatives. Flooz and Beenz tried to create an Internet-only virtual
currency, for example, and a company called CyberCash developed an
unsuccessful service for online micropayments.

The biggest barrier is not technological. It is that Americans think credit
cards are already a fine solution. For a nation that thrives on plastic,
pulling out a credit or debit card is just as convenient as pulling out a
cellphone. It is also expensive for retailers to install machines to scan
cellphones, and many phones' screens are too reflective for scanners to
read.

"Where there's a paper system, it's not that difficult to beat cash with an
electronic payment," said Tim Attinger, Visa's head of global product
innovation. "But in this country, we have yet to find the unique value
proposition that's vastly superior to the existing ways that consumers are
paying."

Someday, scanners could recognize the pattern of blood vessels in a finger
and connect it to a credit card number, according to Alvin and Heidi
Toffler, consultants on economics and technology and authors of
"Revolutionary Wealth," a book about the ways in which wealth will be
created in the future.

But while shoppers wait for that day to arrive, they will be touching,
clicking and swiping cellphones and computer mice more often.

PayPal took a step toward making the virtual wallet more of a reality
recently when it held a conference in San Francisco for 1,500 software
developers to encourage them to incorporate PayPal into a Web or mobile
application. Shoppers have spent $500 million in the last year using eBay's
iPhone application, which is integrated with PayPal.

A start-up called iCents.net wants to give online publishers a way to charge
viewers. For instance, readers could buy a $50 subscription using PayPal,
and each time they read an article on a Web site, 50 cents would be
subtracted.

A developer from Australia is building an application for a real estate
company that would let tenants log on to the landlord's Web site to pay rent
with a single click. A start-up company called MedPayOnline.com is making it
possible for patients to pay medical bills with PayPal.

"Opening up the payment systems in a flexible and frictionless way like
PayPal is doing is a really big deal," said Dana Stalder, a venture
capitalist at Matrix Partners. "I think it will lead to innovation far
beyond what anyone imagines today, and I think it will be the advent of the
digital wallet that goes with you in all parts of your life."

Big credit card companies have also been working on ways to use the Web and
mobile phones to pay. MasterCard partnered with a start-up called Obopay to
make it possible for people to transfer money with a text message. After
they sign up for the service and link their MasterCard number to their
cellphone number, they can send anyone money with a text message. Recipients
who have an account receive the money immediately, and others open an
account to receive the deposit.

In Malaysia, Visa has started installing chips in cellphones so people can
swipe their phone instead of a credit card, though Mr. Attinger said that is
unlikely to take off in the United States anytime soon.

Still, there is a lot of excitement about the idea of phones doubling as
credit cards, and a few companies are trying this on a small scale in the
United States. Starbucks created an iPhone application that lets people
upload money and swipe their phone instead of a card at the cash register. A
company called Bling Nation makes tags linked to bank accounts that users
can stick on the back of cellphones and tap on a point-of-sale terminal.

Pulling out a credit card may be as convenient as a phone when paying
offline, but it can be more convenient to avoid pulling out the card at all
when shopping on a computer or a phone.

Obopay and other start-ups, including Zong and Boku, let people link their
cellphone and credit card numbers so they need only enter their 10-digit
phone number when they want to buy a virtual good online.

In five years, the terminals for swiping credit cards at stores will
probably be connected to the Web wirelessly, so people could use PayPal and
similar services to pay offline as well, Mr. Thompson said. "Offline is
changing so rapidly, and the line is very blurry where off- and online meet
today."



Jeff Snyder, SysOp - Armageddon BBS  Visit us at endtimeprophecy.org port 23
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Your Download Center 4 Mac BBS Software & Christian Files.  We Use Hermes II


--- Hermes Web Tosser 1.1