More Signs Of A Cashless Future?

Drivers in the City of York (UK) who find themselves out of change for the parking meter will be able to pay via a mobile call or SMS text message [Silicon]. And if you’re one of those prone to forgetting when the meter is about to run out, the system being set up will actually call you to remind you. At this point, you can just call back from your mobile phone to extend parking. There’ll be a surcharge of 20p (pence) per payment transactions over GBP 2 (2 British pounds). It’s not contactless payment such as accomplished by RFID-enabled key fobs or touchless credit cards, but I guess it amounts to the same thing.

Wow. Heaven forbid we should walk back to the meter and put in more change. That would take effort. Next thing you know, we’ll all have special “unified communications” chips inserted into our bodies that let us automatically pay for purchases, hear MP3 songs or receive phone calls via a bone implant in our ear (forget Bluetooth), display streaming media to special contact lenses in our eyes, have access to secured areas by pointing a finger (due to a special, implanted chip), and maybe even receive our paychecks directly and digitally to a “personal data warehouse” implant in our skull that also contains passport details. (Was that all one sentence?)

“Sir. Please wave your head over the scanner slowly.” Sorry, just had a Tom Cruise moment. I’ve said to much…