Funny article from Fast Company about ObscuraCam

Announcing ObscuraCam v1 – Enhance Your Visual Privacy! | The Guardian Project.

The app, Obscura Cam is the outcome of the first phase of our
Secure Smart Cam project to create smart phone camera software which allows for greater privacy and security in the capturing and sharing of media.

Of course, it is all open source

A friend just asked me why no-one has risen through the noise. I didn’t think about that particular issue but here are some thoughts I did have:

NFC is not new – Nokia for a while – I don’t think it will make a big difference in the use of mobile payments. (Contactless payments aren’t new either, Citibank/MTA, EZ Pass and so on have been using them for a while)

Overall Issues – trust – Who do people want to put their trust in: carriers? banks? manufacturers?

Big winner likely: Amazon – will retailers trust – consumers say they are the most reputable company in the world.

Other Players:
Isis – carrirers – T-Mobile, AT&T and Verizon
Google – android – probably open – Citibank and Mastercard
Apple – ios – probably will take a big cut
Apple is probably required – as much as I hate to say it – not friendly to small developers – donations

What works now: – points the way towards what will work in the future
Square – fits with what people already do – friendly to small merchants – attaches directly to phone – simple pricing
Starbucks – App linked to CC – Just scan it and the backend system will charge your CC – Control in hands of consumer

Samsung – Olympics – London 2012 big trial

Business Card Transfers
I wonder/fear it will look pretty much like how we exchange contact information now (via paper business cards).
Standards didn’t catch on – security warnings about bluetooth – same will happen with NFC??

NFC will have to be the most secure tech in the world. There is nothing more juicy for a cracker to hack something that is used to transfer money. People will react with viscerally as well. The local news channels will run piece after piece. The wikipedia page is already filled with potential exploits: eavesdropping, data modification, relay attack, lost property, …

The Secure Smart Camera App for Human Rights Video : Video For Change :: A WITNESS blog.

It’s worth a look if you are interested in the intersection of human rights, mobile technology and citizen media. It’s an open source Android project too!

Should be fun!!

Here are the slides and examples:
Camera via Intent
Custom Camera
Custom Camera with Parameters
Custom Audio Player
Audio Recorder
Video Capture

Of course, similar examples plus more can be found in my book, Pro Android Media and the source for the examples in the book is available

From a developer perspective, It’s too bad that Nokia didn’t go the Android direction and work on porting Qt over to Android.