Ideas & Opinions

Become a real-world link to a virtual you… by what you wear

By Mike on 07 November 2008

GLOBAL – The fusion of clothing and technology is nothing new (albeit niche), with some wearable tech enabling you to perform simple tasks such as flick through tracks on your MP3 player by pressing electronically-tailored buttons on your jacket. Now that’s and all well and good, but what about wearing a T-shirt that can act as a portal to your digital social networking world?

Only earlier this week I interviewed Alex Besher about his sci-fi Manga Man project that will only be available to fans via a QR code that you scan on a T-shirt, and today when reading Wired magazine my attention was drawn to a piece on W-41.com – a company that offers customizable T-shirts featuring printed codes that can be photographed to enable the snapper to gain access to your online social networking space via any camera phone.

Of course, this access is very limited, and will only let people leave you messages or view areas of your social network profiles that you want them (or anyone) to be able to see. So essentially, wearing one of these T-shirts from W-41.com turns you into a walking link to your online self.

There’s a piece of downloadable software on the W-41.com site that you put on your phone, and once it’s up and running you simply take a pic of the logo code you spot on someone’s T-shirt and next thing you know you’re virtually stood at their online front door. Scary or smart? I’m on the fence with this one at the moment. Let me know what you reckon.

Share and Enjoy: