Bluetooth Ads Beamed from Billboards 231
dylanduck writes "Billboards in the UK have been using Bluetooth to beam media clips at passing cellular phones. The system has been dubbed Bluecasting and 17,000 people accepted the ads. When billboards know your name that's when to really worry."
BlueTooth Hacking billboards! (Score:5, Interesting)
Sci-Fi (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Cool (Score:3, Interesting)
Hmm, haven't seen these so far (Score:4, Interesting)
They concerned the use of unlicensed faux-minicabs to lure women into situations where they are abducted and often sexually abused.
The billboards allowed you to align your phone's IR receiver with a flashing icon to receive information on how to better protect yourself if you happen to be a woman.
I daresay Bluetooth seems rather more invasive as a means of delivering content - particularly commercial advertising rather than citizen's advice.
It's exactly the same as email spam (Score:3, Interesting)
Dubbed blueSPAMMING, not blueCASTING (Score:5, Interesting)
The real world calls it SPAM. If you have to get trendy, BlueSpamming. Or if you want to get really wild, based on IM SPAM = SPIM, you get BLUE SPAM = SPLUE.
We let them use Hacker for Cracker, and we let them take Digital Rights Management for Digital Restriction Mechanisms. We control the names, folks, not them. A dog does not lay bioreclaimable fertilizer on the path, it shits on the sidewalk. "BlueCasting" sounds like a neat 21st century hip thing. "Spam" is a nasty annoyance that Russians get beat to death for. Give it the correct name.
Is it spam or Will people stop using tech? (Score:2, Interesting)
Exactly. Low tech is the wave of the future.
In the Fremont neighborhood in Seattle, one of the most wired and tech neighborhoods, many of us no longer wear watches or carry cell phones, because they're a nuisance. We let loose the electronic leashes and savor the joy of life.
And then we go home and use our wireless laptops and high-speed cable/DSL/internet2 connections to surf the Net, or drop by a free wireless fair trade organic coffeeshop.
You can either be a slave of the Man, or you can opt out of the Man's rules.
New technology (Score:2, Interesting)
I wonder if, for some people, disabling their phone/device from being discovered via bluetooth will be a viable option? Maybe they need that enabled for something? Too bad there isn't a "DO NOT RECEIVE ADVERTISEMENTS" setting.
Scary Billboards (Score:2, Interesting)
Hmm I wonder.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Got my hopes up when this happened to me (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Well... (Score:4, Interesting)
Me, for one. I've even got it broadcasting my name, so if someone around me finds it, they know who it belongs to.
I don't mind people saying "hi", in a matter of speaking. So far, it's been coworkers etc. who decide to send me files. When I start getting ads/spam on it, I will shut it off.
Re:Sci-Fi (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:bluetooth spam to your phone.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Would such a feature still be possible if your phone was not in "discoverable" mode to block the advertisements? Does a feature like that even exist (I am new to the world of BlueTooth)?
Won't work in Canda (Score:2, Interesting)
I could buy a phone from the US and get it hacked, but why should I lose a warranty and pay a couple hundred dollars when I should be able to get one for FREE or close to it ($99 at most).
How long has bluetooth been an option on cell phones in the US and Europe and yet I still can't get one here.
All I want it is so that I can receive calls on my BT headset and use Sailling Clicker to control my iBook.
To make matters worse
Futureshop (owned by BestBuy), advertised a BT headset right beside the non-BT cell phones instead of in the computer section of the weekly flier.
Trace people using bluetooth MAC (Score:2, Interesting)
a lot about Bluetooth and its protocols but I can
imagine that a device that sends a connection request might get a reply back of the like "I got your request to connect to application X, now hold on while I signal the user and ask her if it is okay". In this case the advertiser gets the MAC even though the user does not authorize the connectino.
*sigh* another reason to keep bluetooth disabled (Score:2, Interesting)
Riiiight.
I find the whole notion of this distasteful. Billboards are bad enough. This is adding spam to them. I don't use Bluetooth now (see no real benefit from it really) and if enabling Bluetooth is going to subject me to spam, no thanks . . .
But, considering in 2000 the hot marketing gimmick was to mount Palm Pilot's around metropolitan areas (at least Manhattan had them) and have people point their Palm at it to sync up an ad . . . and that lasted like a month . . .
Re:If they'd let me do the asking... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Another reason (Score:3, Interesting)
Nah! That's what voice mail is for. Actually among my friends SMS is by far the preferred way of communicating. Not actually speaking to one another. In fact, in order of use, phones are probably used for...
- SMS/Test messages
- Photos
- Providing data connections
- Voice calls.
If work wants to contact me they can buy me a blackberry. They haven't so far and I wont give them my private number.
Other targeted Cell-phone ads (Score:2, Interesting)
Fortunately, that has seemed to fade away. UNfortunately, Bluetooth ads are much easier, unless it comes to the US and they want to target Verizon customers, since Verizon sells "Bluetooth" phones with their balls chopped off [slashdot.org].
Never mind that (Score:3, Interesting)
Imagine being somewhere like a casino (where you can bet they already or will soon will use face recognition on everyone). Cameras could be positioned in certain places to automatically recognise a person and change all the machines and signs within the proximity to be more appealing.
Hell, I bet a system could pitch different ads depending on whether a man, women, or kids were walking past based on their smell. For extra sophistication it could even detect BO & perfume as giveaways of the person's wealth and status.