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Ambient wireless using pager technology to "trickle" data to mobile users

The term "bit-trickle" defines a new wireless Internet world - using wavebands which were once popular for pagers, to drip data for update purposes into mobile devices.

For example a five day Radio Shack weather forecast device for a car, receives regular updates from Accuweather. Alternatively, there's the Ambient Beacon [right] which "glows the forecast using colour, shading redder if it will be warmer, going bluer if it is going to cool - and pulsing if it is expected to rain.

In-car navigation can be bit-trickled with traffic jam news, says Ambient, while the long-predicted "internet gas meter" can become a reality, offering special pricing for off-peak use when demand drops, as new price rates are trickled into the device. Electric meters, of course, were all going to get their bit-trickles from the mains itself - another dream which isn't widely fulfilled; but now it can be.

IN medicine, there are other opportunities: "A number of trends conspire to create an interesting opportunity for home sensing and information display," says Ambient. The company lists demographics (graying of America) as one influence.

"Other trends include regulatory (e-scripts medicare mandate) and cultural (decentralisation and democratisation of care from doc in clinic to empowered, knowledgeably involved consumer)" it suggests, adding that half of the prescriptions written for chronic disease states are never picked up and $43B of pharmaceutical sales are lost annually because of non-compliance.

Full details from Ambient