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No one cares about smart watches.

You mean YOU don't care to be more accurate, the millions of people every major electronics manufacturers INCLUDING Apple has targeted for sales.. do, and that's ignoring all previous and current smartwatch owners.

Ha..Seems your really reaching for an answer...lol. Anyway it does seem to integrate its own cell phone features...but...it comes with trade offs. Dismal battery life. Awkward for phone calls holding your wrist to your ear, so mainly bluetooth ear piece? Small screen size. I don't see this taking off, at all.

Sure, it works, but would anybody really buy it for their main cell phone?

Well, if you mean reaching by providing a device that does not need a smartphone to work? And the device has been around for a few years, I remember seeing an older version at a show 3 or 4 years ago now so yeah they are doing alright despite your naivety about it.

And all those trade offs will be exactly the current smartphones or iWatch.
 
I still don't understand people's fascination with NFC. My iPhone has enough radios in it already-- surely there's one for everything I want to do. Particularly if that thing involves sending very slow data over a very short range. Unless it's really important that you conduct your credit card transactions under water, there is no real benefit to using magnetics for comms.

Granted this wouldn't be the first time a technology was adopted for non-technical reasons, but I'd leave NFC to the RFID world and use other methods for transactions.

One of the reasons slowing the successful and widespread use of NFC was the lack of it on the iPhone. I hope Apple finally adds NFC (it's great!), but I'm also a bit pissed off it will happen so late.

Personally I'm saddened that more and more Apple is now catching up, late, slow, neglecting (Mac Pro, now Mac Mini, Apple TV (outdated UI, no App Store)). Apple also overslept the streaming music revolution (think Spotify). I don't buy this BS about "getting it right". If Google can figure out NFC, Apple can too. And Apple also can put a current-gen processor in a Mac Mini and not neglect it for 2 years, even if they are working (I'm guessing) on a completely new thinner version (OMG, thinner, can you believe it).

Sorry for the rant, but I seriously start to lose my admiration for Apple.

PS - my brand new iPhone 5s hangs up and restarts at least once or twice a day. WTF! :mad:
It sounds like your iPhone is broken-- if you can't fix it with a restore, then bring it back to Apple.

Apple is providing a lower priced Mac Mini while maintaining their margins. If you need the extra horsepower, you should consider a different model. I'm running Mac Minis I bought 5 years ago and they're doing just fine at their assigned tasks.

A significant amount of what you're blaming Apple for lagging on is where Apple has led with the right tech and the rest of the industry has been forced to circle the wagons and offer a common (if often inferior) alternative in an attempt to compete.

You're right, of course, if everyone used it then everyone would be using it-- but that's certainly not a good reason for everyone to start. I have not yet been denied a purchase because of my iPhone.
 
Is that time of year already …

for "every year about 5 months before new iPhone release" ; do
echo "next iPhone will have NFC, for sure this time"
done
 
I'm getting that yo yo sensation. NFC was great when it was rumored to be coming with the iPhone 5. It wasn't included, so NFC became a needless, dead technology. Now it's rumored to be coming with the iPhone 6, so now it is a great feature again? :confused:

It's always been a good technology. It's a shame the idiots have the loudest voices, and as usual they have claimed X, Y and Z about NFC.

It comes down to how useful would it be when implemented. As a few have alluded to in the thread. It's a bit chicken and egg. You need the tech in the handset, but you also need the outside world to accept it too (in the UK contactless payment is growing, but it's still not very common, then there are things like the Oyster card limited to London).

With these technologies Apple seems to take slow approach similar to LTE, they waited until the tech was widespread and that the battery requirements came down. As opposed to say things like Retina and their TouchID which they were front runners.

With NFC it seems as though they also want a strong back end - I'm thinking/hoping a payment platform integrated into the users iTunes account.
 
It's always been a good technology. It's a shame the idiots have the loudest voices, and as usual they have claimed X, Y and Z about NFC.

It comes down to how useful would it be when implemented. As a few have alluded to in the thread. It's a bit chicken and egg. You need the tech in the handset, but you also need the outside world to accept it too (in the UK contactless payment is growing, but it's still not very common, then there are things like the Oyster card limited to London).

With these technologies Apple seems to take slow approach similar to LTE, they waited until the tech was widespread and that the battery requirements came down. As opposed to say things like Retina and their TouchID which they were front runners.

With NFC it seems as though they also want a strong back end - I'm thinking/hoping a payment platform integrated into the users iTunes account.

From the NFC debate here over the last year or so, it seems to me that if Apple includes it, it's good. Since Apple hasn't included it to date, it became a gimmick when others have. :eek:
 
You mean YOU don't care to be more accurate, the millions of people every major electronics manufacturers INCLUDING Apple has targeted for sales.. do, and that's ignoring all previous and current smartwatch owners.
Major electronics manufacturers including Apple HOPE that the millions of people they've targeted for sales care about smart watches, to be more accurate. I haven't seen much evidence of anything but the manufacturers hoping to ignite user interest in order to compensate for falling margins and declining innovation in smart phones.

Maybe it'll catch on but so far, outside of a niche market, I don't see this being a consumer driven development.
 
Here in Belgium people mocked my iPhone for not having NFC, then when I asked if they had ever used it on their masterrace phone, they went like: "... No, but it's coming soon, so..."

To this day, I have never encountered something that supports NFC. And neither have they.

Is it the same in the States or elsewhere? Is it slowly becoming more popular? Because then it would make sense to incorporate it, as the time is (finally) ripe.

I hate putting in technology for the sake of putting in technology.

I guess some people use it, but I don't know anyone that does use NFC for shopping.
 
From the NFC debate here over the last year or so, it seems to me that if Apple includes it, it's good. Since Apple hasn't included it to date, it became a gimmick when others have. :eek:

I think you're misreading the tone. What I'm getting is that it's a gimmick that some people think could become great if only everyone bought into the gimmick:

One of the reasons slowing the successful and widespread use of NFC was the lack of it on the iPhone. I hope Apple finally adds NFC (it's great!), but I'm also a bit pissed off it will happen so late.
But how can a technology like NFC become widespread, if one of the leading platforms (iPhone) is not using it? This is not technology for the sake of technology. This is the old chicken and egg problem.
If it's a chicken and egg problem, then there isn't sufficient motivation to solve it from both ends. With BLE, for example, the chicken already exists.
 
INCORRECT!

1) You haven't studied the Target et al. POS malware robbery of customer accounts, have you. :(

I have. I also understand that it was not about NFC.

NO, NFC data is NOT encrypted when it is in memory on the POS machines. That data is in-the-clear. This is specifically why the robbery of 110 million accounts was possible. NFC chips improve nothing at all regarding account robbery.

Neither did NFC chips cause it.

What happened was that crooks uploaded hacked software to the Windows based POS terminals (cash registers) that watched for any magnetic credit card data read into memory from the attached swipe device.

2) NO, NOT all payment NFC cards are encrypted.

Who's talking about NFC cards? The thread topic is NFC on smartphones.

All of the above listed payment cards are obviously NOT protected from trivial scanning by anyone, as illustrated by their need for protective Faraday cage sleeves.

Just because sleeve sellers take advantage of people's fears, does not mean there's an actual "need".

All the credit cards you mentioned are encrypted, and the user protected by the usual no fault terms even if a hacker did manage to pull off something like a relay attack.
 
Are you aware that what you described is the very definition of innovation?
Like a touchscreen and rounded corners? Maybe like look and feel? Then sue everyone that uses it and act like they invented it? Thats great innovation.......
You have to admit Apple is very late to the party with NFC. But they will releases something that uses NFC and claim their version is better than anyone else's. How are they going to explain a larger iPhone? They are copying what the market has already done....they are playing catch up to their competition. After saying anything larger than the original iPhones 3.5 screen was too big. Just like copy paste....NFC...larger screens.....iPad screen size was perfect....no need for anything smaller.....then oh until the iPad mini.....

If i take a white egg and color it purple...then hail it as innovation does that count in your premises?
 
I'm getting that yo yo sensation. NFC was great when it was rumored to be coming with the iPhone 5. It wasn't included, so NFC became a needless, dead technology. Now it's rumored to be coming with the iPhone 6, so now it is a great feature again? :confused:

Indeed a lot of people here seem to be hurt by realization that despite Apple spin on the subject their phones indeed were missing valuable features available on many competing products. This would not be the first time for Apple of course. They routinely trash talk the features missing in their devices - until they manage to implement them themselves. Perhaps this is a strange way of caring for their customers - make sure they do not feel as they have inferior products by lying about the advantages of competing products.
 
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NFC seems like an idea waiting for a purpose. i'm sure bank cards now come with stickers that you can use with contact less payment if you stick em to your phone.

Apple store already has a payment system you can scan items and pay for them and leave without needing to be near anything at all you do it all in the app store.

I can understand doing the finger print as verification but whether it that or a pin code you really don't need to add in NFC to the equation or even a POS station.

Am I missing something here or what?

Well that depends on how narrow your vision of the technology is. Here in Sweden, NFC is a part of probably 75% of the populations daily lives, because it is used as the sole means of paying for local and regional mass transit. NFC cards can be bought and/or loaded up/recharged at any convenience store, and fairs for buses, street cars, light rail, and subways are all paid for by putting your rail card in close proximity to the reader machines.

Not a long step to provide smartphones with NFC capability an app to replace the cards...there are tons of applications for this, secure access to office buildings, files transfer initiations, credential certifications, etc. It is not just about paying for your groceries.
 
Major electronics manufacturers including Apple HOPE that the millions of people they've targeted for sales care about smart watches, to be more accurate. I haven't seen much evidence of anything but the manufacturers hoping to ignite user interest in order to compensate for falling margins and declining innovation in smart phones.

Maybe it'll catch on but so far, outside of a niche market, I don't see this being a consumer driven development.

Yeah, they have a few years of the smartwatch market already to look at for figures and facts to use for their predictions. It will catch on because they will make sure it does. How often has the electronics industry as a whole got it wrong?
 
This shouldn't come as a surprise.

it was actually more surprising that NFC wasn't in the iPhone 5.

Apple has been filing NFC related patents for a couple years now.

http://www.patentlyapple.com/.services/blog/6a0120a5580826970c0120a5580ebf970c/search?filter.q=NFC
Ah, but there is the thing branded as NFC and there is Near Field Communication. The thing branded as NFC is a standard for one way to do Near Field Communication. Bluetooth LE can communicate using electromagnetic fields over short ranges too.
Also the patents mention that coupling can be capacitative, that rules out NFC (and BLE).
 
Wow, personally I have an iPhone 4 in a drawer and a Galaxy S3 (with NFC) that has been my main phone for a couple of years. I just assumed NFC was in iPhone 5 and 5s, quite shocked it isn't actually.

Here in Canada, which is usually a bit behind the UK and USA, NFC is in 60%+ of the shops. It really is great just being able to tap your phone or your card at the checkout. I really notice when it isn't available, the places it usually isn't are restaurants and takeaways, *I think* because they want you to go through the machine so they can ask you for a tip. All the same, NFC is great.... put it in iPhone 6!

Quite honestly I'm watching to see what iPhone 6 is like, maybe upgrade to it... but I'm thinking no NFC is actually a deal breaker!
 
Like a touchscreen and rounded corners? Maybe like look and feel? Then sue everyone that uses it and act like they invented it? Thats great innovation.......
You have to admit Apple is very late to the party with NFC. But they will releases something that uses NFC and claim their version is better than anyone else's. How are they going to explain a larger iPhone? They are copying what the market has already done....they are playing catch up to their competition. After saying anything larger than the original iPhones 3.5 screen was too big. Just like copy paste....NFC...larger screens.....iPad screen size was perfect....no need for anything smaller.....then oh until the iPad mini.....

If i take a white egg and color it purple...then hail it as innovation does that count in your premises?

Nice strawman. I was simply pointing out that putting your own twist on something is what innovation is.
 
Wow, personally I have an iPhone 4 in a drawer and a Galaxy S3 (with NFC) that has been my main phone for a couple of years. I just assumed NFC was in iPhone 5 and 5s, quite shocked it isn't actually.

Here in Canada, which is usually a bit behind the UK and USA, NFC is in 60%+ of the shops. It really is great just being able to tap your phone or your card at the checkout. I really notice when it isn't available, the places it usually isn't are restaurants and takeaways, *I think* because they want you to go through the machine so they can ask you for a tip. All the same, NFC is great.... put it in iPhone 6!

Quite honestly I'm watching to see what iPhone 6 is like, maybe upgrade to it... but I'm thinking no NFC is actually a deal breaker!

What are you using as your payment app of choice?

here in Canada as you noted NFC terminals are just about everywhere now! anyone who has a Chip+Pin setup also generally has NFC setup as well.

For any purchases < $50, i just use the tap feature directly on the credit card. I haven't yet found an App to allow me to use NFC on my phone for payments, Though I would love to.
 
Is everyone here ok with the fact that Apple integrating NFC in iPhone?? But.. but.. everyone went nuts at Samsung for implementing fingerprint scanner?
 
If China wants NFC, China gets NFC. NFC is not a good system. I wouldn't be surprised if they only allow NFC payments on Chinese Carrier iPhones.
 
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