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Introducing Isobar Create London, together with O2, an NFC weekend developer event

Introducing Isobar Create London, together with O2, an NFC weekend developer event

  • Author:

    Fran :

    New Biz & Marketing

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Calling all talented developers and designers…

We’d like you to join Isobar Create London (together with O2), the UK’s first developer event that will challenge people to pioneer new and innovative uses of Near Field Communications (NFC) technology.  

This is an open invitation for you to attend and help define the future of this exciting technology.  

In addition to being amongst the first people to get a hands on opportunity with the latest in NFC technology, you’ll have a chance to win loads of goodies such as mobile handsets, and even have your idea brought to life courtesy of a kick-starter fund from BlueVia.

We’ll also have guest speakers and food provided throughout so read on and sign up.

When: Saturday March 24th, through the night to Sunday March 25th. Doors open 8am on Saturday for a 10am kick-off. Teams to finish and present ideas at 4pm on Sunday.

Where: Shoreditch Studios, Old Street, London MAP

Who: Isobar Create London, together with O2, is for developers and designers who have big ideas, the skill to bring them to life, and who aren’t scared of working through the night.

We’re looking for teams of up to 5 people. You can sign up as a ready-formed team, or sign up as an individual and pair up with others at the event.

REGISTRATION HAS NOW CLOSED
If you are part of a team and have not yet registered, email create.london@isobar.com

We’ve also lined up an esteemed panel of judges from the digital and tech world including Isobar, O2 and BlackBerry. More to follow.

What types of NFC applications can I develop?

We’re looking for teams to pioneer new uses of NFC. We think NFC will have a massive impact on the retail industry, the leisure and entertainment industry, the finance industry, and sporting events.

You can harness NFC in any of the 5 following ways:

  • Phone to phone: Transferring something meaningful from one phone to another using NFC.
  • Phone to tag: Using tags where the phone (or a reader) can read data and react to it. Sometimes the data is a URL; other times it is just the ID of the device.
  • Phone to reader: Having the phone act as a tag (or a card) and ‘speak’ to a computer with a tag reader attached to it.
  • Tag to reader: Similar to phone to tag, only that a computer with a reader ‘responds’ to reading the tag.
  • Phone to simulator: We will create ‘simulators’ of real-world machines we envision using NFC and how they can exchange data with smartphones. Examples include a petrol pump and a cash register. Participants will be able to create apps that ‘talk’ to these simulators.

We’ll provide the space, the food, mobile devices, NFC tags, NFC readers and demo code. Attendees should be prepared to bring their laptop, power cables (and any other tools they need to create and develop with).

What can I win?

There will be a variety of swag to give out to the winning teams and runners up, plus a chance to win:

  • The latest Blackberry and Samsung mobile devices
  • …  and, if the judges spot an idea that is cool, creative, has commercial potential and uses one or more of the BlueVia APIs, then the BlueVia team will work with you to bring that idea to market.  This includes a development fund kick-starter plus marketing support to launch your product to market, including promotion in an NFC enabled bus shelter in a central London location – courtesy of Clear Channel.
  • Further Prizes to be announced shortly

Don’t worry if you are not familiar with the BlueVia APIs, our technical people will be on site at the event to provide an overview of their features, and to help step you through integrating and using them.

We’ll also have goody bags for every attendee.

What criteria will determine the winners?

NFC applications should be focused on improving interactions between brands and consumers. Each team is expected to build a technical proof of concept during the event. Each idea must have a technical implementation. Winners will be based on whether their app fundamentally changes the way businesses operate or the way consumers behave, or both. Using a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being the best, apps will be judged by the following criteria:

  • Level of innovation (e.g., is it something completely new)
  • The ‘like never before’ factor (e.g., novelty value and overall coolness of the idea)
  • Impact on consumers (e.g., does it fundamentally change the way consumers behave)
  • Impact on a brand or a business (e.g., does it increase sales, improve customer retention, etc.?)
  • Commercial viability and market potential (e.g., does it have the ability to succeed and be profitable)

What will I get on the day?

Isobar and O2 will provide the facilities, power, connectivity, good food, and refreshments. Experts and designers will be on-hand to help you think through your idea, answer questions and give advice.

We’ll also have the following equipment on hand, including: Galaxy S2 phones, Blackberry phones, NFC Tags to make real-world objects ‘machine readable, NFC Readers (SCM 3711), and Demo code (which will be supplied to registrants closer to the event). NFC Campaign Management Platforms will be available to use, including TouchPoint, which provides content creation wizards and NFC programming tools.

How can I prepare?

Here are some links to documentation and technical resources that may help:

More information on demo code will be sent to registrants nearer to the event.

Who are the judges?

When coding ends at 4pm on Sunday 25th, each team will have 3 minutes to present their work to the audience and our esteemed panel of judges, which so far includes:

  • Stephen Bedggood, NFC Product Manager – O2
  • Neil Garner, Chief Executive Officer - Proxama
  • Blackberry (tbc)
  • Andres-Leonardo Martinez-Ortiz, Developer Program Engineer - BlueVia
  • John Ridpath - Contagious Magazine
  • Niku Banaie, Chief Innovation Officer – Isobar
  • Dom O’Brien, Head of Innovation – glue Isobar

I can’t stay the whole 36 hours, can I still participate?

Of course! We realise that 36 hours is a long time, and that some people might have other commitments. We do strongly encourage you to be present as much time as possible, especially for the final few hours for the presentations and judging. The more you put in, the more you will get out of it, and the prizes are worth a sleepness night! If you can, plan to stay. We’ll feed you and keep you entertained.

Who owns the code I write?

You do, unless you’re using something that belongs to someone else. We’d like to make a few screenshots of promising projects, and we’ll be video taping certain parts of the event for public relations and marketing communication purposes; we assume that’s okay.

Who are the guest speakers?

We’ve got a great line up of speakers for the event including:

  • Brendan Marry, Chief NFC Engineer Europe, Google
  • More to follow!

REGISTRATION HAS NOW CLOSED
If you are part of a team and have not yet registered, email create.london@isobar.com

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