Wallets that Metamorphose Depending on Your Financial Situation | Hacker News Reader

Wallets that Metamorphose Depending on Your Financial Situation

good.is

17 pointsrobg6 comments

Hmmm, I would short this idea.

The trend will be away from wallets to phones. No need for a wallet to carry your credit card in, if your phone uses near field communication to be a credit card itself.

A widget on your phone that can display a picture of a full/empty wallet would be more in line with where the world is going, in my opinion, then an actual wallet that I have to charge batteries, bluetooth pair to my phone, etc.

I'm pretty careful nowadays about carrying the bare minimum of stuff in my wallet, so I've rationalized down to the stuff I really need. But in addition to debit and credit cards, my wallet has a driver's licence, an employee ID card, a couple of health insurance cards, a stored-value smartcard for public transport, and a random "free movie ticket" voucher that I'm gonna get around to using one of these days. Oh, and some cash.

Even if I gave up using cash and rolled all my credit cards into my phone, I'm still carrying around a bunch of cards from random bureaucratic organizations which don't have much interest in changing their systems to enable me to avoid carrying around their little card. I'm not sure how a phone-based driver's licence would work (considering that I mostly use my driver's license to as proof of age to get into bars). Besides, my wallet is a convenient place to keep stuff, like that movie ticket I mentioned earlier.

Besides, damn near every time I try to buy something the clerk is obliged to try to convince me to acquire one of the loyalty cards for whatever store I'm at. Ohh, little plastic cards aren't going anywhere any time soon.

Oh, and my phone battery goes flat often enough as it is. If this left me not only incommunicado but also moneyless, this would be a serious problem.

I suspect I will also continue to carry a wallet. (a cloth one, not one with bluetooth in it)

The point of the bluetooth wallet is to remind you of your bank balance since you're using electronic payment. My point was that, when you go to buy something with electronic payment, it will be with your phone ... and so you won't be opening your wallet in the first place, even if you do still have it in your pocket to carry your pizza coupons.

The Mother Bear [wallet] (pictured) has a hinge that makes it harder to open if you are approaching monthly budgets.

Seriously, that is funny.

I like the concept of these wallets, but the idea of having to plug my wallet in every night to charge a battery is less than appealing. I think the simplicity of the wallet, especially in today's world of smart phones, is one of its most attractive features.

Wireless charging stations will probably prevail eventually. If they went that way, all you'd have to do is stick it next to your phone on a charging pad - you probably already have them near each other frequently.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com