Forget cellphone ringtones and vibrate alerts - in future you may be alerted to an incoming phone call, text message or a flat battery by vibrations from a magnetic “tattoo” etched into your skin.
That is, if the patent filed by Finnish smartphone company Nokia for “haptic communication between a user and an electronic device”, filed in September last year, is ever commercialised.
According to the official Nokia patent application, the cutaneous/magnetic system could work in two ways. The first involves an electronic material, detachable from your skin, which is paired with a phone and vibrates when you receive a phone call or message. The vibration, says the application, is caused by the smartphone transmitting mechanical vibrations and/or pulses to the material attached to the skin, which is capable of detecting a magnetic field.
The second, along the lines of a tattoo, would involve the permanent application of ferromagnetic ink into skin. It would be like a normal tattoo, in any shape or form, but it would be magnetised so as to pick up a magnetic field from the phone when it rings or gives any other alerts.
Nokia's patent description lists the forms the skin vibrations could take: “Examples of characters, features or applications may be low battery indication, received message, received call, calendar alert, change of profile, eg, based on timing, change of time zone, or any other.”
It further says the user may customise the characteristics of the magnetic field, like one would customise sound and alert profiles on a cellphone. “The electronic device may include options for different kind of haptic feedbacks, among which the user may choose to personalise the device. The magnetic field, when detected by the apparatus, will cause a different effect based on its characteristics. For example, the magnetic field may cause vibration of one short pulse, multiple short pulses, few long pulses, mixture of short and long pulses, strong pulses, weak pulses, and so on.”
The patent's inventors - Zoran Radivojevic, Piers Andrew, Jarkko Saunamaki and Tapani Jokinen - say, however, there is much scope for variation as far as the vibrating tattoo goes. “While the above describes example embodiments of the invention, these descriptions should not be viewed in a limiting sense. Rather, there are several variations and modifications which may be made.”
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