Near field technology has been around for a couple of years now, but will it finally have its breakthrough later this year when the new iPhone comes out? A good reason for us to take another closer look at the technology.

Introducing Digital-Gum-Goods.

This is an NFC-enabled Gum Machine we have built at Razorfish that is packed with all sorts of digital goodies: Apps, movies, songs, ebooks, as well as other exclusive and location-based content that can be pushed to a phone. Simply enter a coin and turn the lever – then follow the animation and tap your smartphone next to the release chute.

Tadaaaa!

The project was realized in a 2 day prototyping session at Razorfish’s Frankfurt office. In terms of hardware, we used a Samsung Galaxy Tab, an NFC shield, a simple reed switch and two Arduino microcontrollers – all nicely fitted into an original Gum Machine metal base.

This is an example of how NFC Technology can provide a missing link between the physical and the digital by bringing the best of both worlds together.

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Download Presskit | High-resolution images for print available on request.