Chase recently released an iPhone app where you can deposit a check via your iPhone. Chase has had ATM’s for awhile where you can just insert your check into the ATM for a deposit (no deposit slip, envelopes, etc.) and it appears that the iPhone is using similar photo recognition technology via it’s app. As for the process of depositing a check through the app? It took a total of about 2 minutes and I can say after using this, I will probably never need to go to an ATM again. Of course, there is a current caveat that you can only deposit up to $1,000 a day so hopefully after some use in the wild, Chase will raise the minimums very soon. I’ve included screenshots below of the process to show how easy the process is. Again, amazing technology which you rarely see especially from the banking industry.
STEP 1: Go to Deposit on the App Menu
STEP 2: Accept Legalese (Thank you Chase for making this VERY short)
STEP 3: Go to Deposit Screen
STEP 4: Take a Picture Of Your Check (front and back)
STEP 5: Upload and submit deposit (App will automatically detect routing/bank number)
STEP 6: Email confirmation seconds later
Conclusion: This is the future of checking and a great way to save a trip to the bank. Despite some quirks (one of which is major – I was able to deposit the check above even without a signature on the front of the check) this is a great leap forward by Chase in terms of usability and execution with regards to mobile innovation.
Over the next few months, we’re likely going to see a deluge of marker based mobile Augmented Reality as marketers now have the ability to spin an animation on a marker in a mobile environment. I wish I was more optimistic in this regard, but seeing how many brands created web-based AR executions solely for PR value, I see the same thing happening with Mobile AR as well. Given that inevitability, I think most marketers should at least take note of this example of Mobile AR that works – iButterfly. It’s using existing mobile AR technology to create a unique experience that involves 3 key areas for mobile AR:
Interaction with environment
Sharing
Drive to retail (via couponing)
Needless to say, the more I watch this video, the more this app is growing on me and becoming one of my favorite mobile AR executions.
P.S. My favorite Mobile AR app though is still Sunseeker. This app allows you to see the position of the sun at any day/time throughout the year. This would allow you to see when the sun would come in through a window in a new home, where a garden would be placed for optimal sunlight, and so on. Case in point that Mobile AR can be useful even with tech at the stage it’s at…
“Censorship reflects a society’s lack of confidence in itself. It is a hallmark of an authoritarian regime.”
Potter Stewart
We try to keep this blog as objective as possible, but recent moves by Apple has unfortunately brought out very subjective opinions from people here – including myself. The latest issue revolves around Apple removing the iChatr App from the iPhone. If you’re unfamiliar with iChatr it is basically a video chat app that uses the front facing camera for random video chats – think mobile Chatroulette. According to the developers, the app was pulled “due to reports of a number of users exposing themselves during the random video chat sessions.” You can read more here.
Now that the explanation is out of the way, let me start with the rant. When is Steve Jobs going to stop forcing random censorship on iPhone owners and trying to tell us what we can and can’t install/have/view on the iPhone???? What’s next, removing other chat apps for people swearing at each other? This goes beyond a software/app issue as it’s the way people are using it that is the cause for censorship via removal. iChatr functions exactly like Face Time though the connections on iChatr are random and anybody using the app knows that. If people start exposing themselves on Face Time is Apple suddenly going to pull their own Face Time chat app from the iPhone platform? This not only reeks of self indulgent censorship on Apple’s part but also exposes Apple’s increasingly anti-competitive nature.
Recent video chat apps such as iChatr and Fring have suddenly been coming under fire after being initially approved by Apple and posted to the App Store. What my gut thinks is that these apps were approved but then someone at Apple realized that these were in fact competitors to Face Time and iChatr was promptly removed, with Fring presumably close behind. I tried to explain how mobile video chat would take off in this previous post, but only through software that was multi-platform and allowed users to talk to each other on different handsets – like Fring but not like Face Time.
This latest move by Apple is another serious misstep and I’m really at a point of ridding myself of Apple and the iPhone once and for all. I want a device that I can put what I want on it and not have somebody else telling me what is appropriate or not on the device I purchased. Apple’s views and policies are increasingly going against the very basic principles this country was founded on.
At least the Gizmodo community thinks this is ridiculous too. If you feel differently, feel free to comment below or hit me up on Twitter @kobrakai.
From a standpoint on whether providing these DIY application makers work, we would be quick to point out yes, as the FreeTwitterDesigner (FTD) application we launched back in February 2009 still averages about 4,000 unique visitors a day. Most of the users of FTD don’t have graphic design skills, but using the FTD app we created, have created their own Twitter background. So, I do think App Inventor will be quick to catch on and looks fairly user-friendly from video below…
We Are Organized Chaos (WAOC) is Zugara’s (www.zugara.com) interactive marketing and advertising blog where we’ll be featuring some great projects and discussing upcoming trends in the digital world. Work — good and bad — will be critiqued. Hope you’ll enjoy reading our insights and thoughts on interactive.
