I've written a new article covering smart property, that is, physical items in the real world whose ownership is controlled by the Bitcoin block chain. You can find it here:
https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Smart_Property
I give cars, phones and house locks as examples of things which can be traded or used as collateral in a cryptographically mediated way. Feedback welcome as always.
https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Smart_Property
I give cars, phones and house locks as examples of things which can be traded or used as collateral in a cryptographically mediated way. Feedback welcome as always.
After my London stay, hotel room locks come to mind also
EDIT: I'm trying to come up with more "immediate" (not that Mikes examples are unrealistic, they are just a bit far away for now) examples, something we can do now, rather than after having the automobile industry embrace bitcoin, which might take another year or 1.5 ;->.
Maybe access to gaming platforms is feasable, or access to servers? Could we make a pam module?
Also seen in London: unattended public bike rentals, similar to the car situation. Like your hotel lock example, once internet connectivity becomes cheap and widespread enough to embed anywhere, you could potentially "smartify" all kinds of miniobjects like parking spaces or stadium seats whereby they'd restrict or allow occupancy through blockchain address ownership, instead of using meters or physical tickets.
Also, DRM on music/movies/content/ppv (physical disc, or digital download) could potentially be implemented as a smart property, this seems more likely in the near term than the car scenario.