Paypal Demos Change-Free Gumball Machine

At the recent Paypal X Innovate 2010 Developers Conference, held in San Diego, CA in late October, Paypal Labs showed off their proof-of-concept change-free gumball machine.

A clever combination of PayPal, QR codes (a type of barcode that can be scanned on a smartphone and can contain various kinds of information, including web links), smartphones and Twitter, the gumball machine instantly debited a PayPal account and dispensed a gumball to anyone with the capability to read QR codes on their mobile phone.

The machine, otherwise an ordinary gumball vending machine as might be seen in any local mall or grocery store, uses an Ardriuno processor along with a WiShield to enable the process.

The client simply loads a QR code scanner such as QuickMark and scans the code on the machine. Their PayPal account is debited, a Tweet is sent to their phone via Twitter, and the machine delivers a gumball, all in seconds and without any physical interaction with the machine.

All right, so it's fair to say that the ability to buy a gumball without a quarter is not earth-shaking; but this technology, now that it has successfully been proven to work, can be applied to literally any product, and not just for in-store purposes. A QR code printed on literally any product would allow you to search for - and purchase - anything that you see instantly. Scary? Absolutely. But useful, too. Imagine that you read the first chapter of a book at a friend's house and would like to buy it to read the rest. Pull out your phone and with two quick taps a copy is being shipped to you through Amazon. Tired of long lines in fast food? Sit down, scan the code on the table and the menu codes of the items you want and they're delivered a few minutes later, without ever pulling out your wallet.

The long story short is that the possibilities are endless. These technologies are the ones that will rapidly move us toward a cashless society. Of course, they also make keeping your phone secure that much more important, and security technology will have to develop apace. On the other hand, if your phone is stolen, stopping the payments and tracing the thief would be a fairly simple matter and any large items would likely be automatically shipped to your registered address as a matter of security, making such a theft practically worthless.

In the long run, I'm very nervous, but very excited to see what happens to our traditional economy over the next few years.