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Any idea what this is? If you think it looks a bit like one of those electronic stamps, then you're not far from the truth. Not far because it's more expensive, and rightly so since it entitled me to take the train from Basel to Zürich & back today. It comes in the form of an MMS that you receive on your mobile phone, which you then proceed to show to the ticket collector on the train. Who may or may not be impressed by your display of technical wizardry - good fun! Just take care to not run low on your phone's battery, ere you might be stranded at your destination ...
06/07/2006
Ticketing
Any idea what this is? If you think it looks a bit like one of those electronic stamps, then you're not far from the truth. Not far because it's more expensive, and rightly so since it entitled me to take the train from Basel to Zürich & back today. It comes in the form of an MMS that you receive on your mobile phone, which you then proceed to show to the ticket collector on the train. Who may or may not be impressed by your display of technical wizardry - good fun! Just take care to not run low on your phone's battery, ere you might be stranded at your destination ...
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2 comments:
That's plain weird. What if my phone is stolen/lost/forgotten at home? Or what if I forge the logo? And how can they know if the digital image is genuine? Do I send it to HIS phone over Bluetooth? What if we're in a dead-zone? Blah!
As for losing the phone: same problem applies to physical tickets.
Regarding security: the pattern you see in the picture likely contains a digital signature which the ticket collector scans and verifies on his proprietary PDA thing. So, no forging that - it's probably much more forgery proof than any physical ticket.
There's no need for a live service connection to use the ticket once it is received. Hey, you seem to be quite the tech sceptic - what gives?!
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