Hmmmm.....SUICA is not accepted by others. Edy Card is another implementation of the same Sony's RFID card system, but, Edy card cannot be used as SUICA, or vice versa. Normally, Edy card can be used only in single convenience store chain "ampm". It is nothing convenient in fact. IC phone card is also available but it can only be used as phone card. Such single-target cards are introduced by many. And, I have several RFID cards, and more magnetic cards in my wallet now. Of course, I sometimes (frequently) juggled them and cause jammed.:-(
BTW, you don't need to worry about Big Brother-ing by railway company, but, you need to worry about CAMERA's set on EVERY road in the country. No, it is not an over-speed vehicle catcher, but, it records every license plate of the car running under that camera. And it is connected to the police station near you. Interesting, isn't it?;-)
The term of commutation-ticket type SUICA is still limited to 6 months. You can just renew the term without changing the card. But, renewal will not happen before its time limit nears. You cannot have such thing as 10-year effective commutation card. And, SUICA can hold cash value beside its commutation-ticket functionality, but, it is also limited to 20,000 yen. So there IS a limit of the cash we can hold into the card.
We have just saw the banner of the "SUICA's first anniversary" in JR stations. And, you're right, RFID card system is nothing new, and we're heavily learning to do our daily life with it here in Tokyo area.:-)
Non commutation type SUICA (SUICA IO card, a prepaid type), is convenient and used by some people including me.:-) And, in these days, convenience store "ampm" has "Edy card". It is the same system of SUICA. You can pay OBENTO and drinks, with Edy card. They are all based on SONY's RFID card system. Newest CLIE can read them via its integrated RF card reader.
Actually, railway company keeps record of you and that "Commutation-Card". When you purchase your "commutation ticket" in Japan, you must write your name, address and company name on the application document. And, you can get your card reissued when you lost your card, because railway company can disable lost card by its unique ID recorded on their computer. But, in current implementation, this can not truly work as a Big Brother tracking system, because the card cannot be read until it is put to the ticket-gate nearly enough (5 or 10 cm, I have heard). I don't know about the future, but, it is OK for us, for now.
Your talking "plastic" cards are just magnetic cards. In those days, we must insert them into the ticket gate machine. Those magnetic cards are just commutation-tickets, and the companies are just paying their commuting fares beforehand. This SUICA (I don't know what it stands for, but, in Japanese, the word "SUIKA" means "watermelon":)) NYT is discussing, does communication to gate machines via Radio so we can go through without taking that card out from wallet. It will sometimes save great cost and time because it will never jammed.:-)
I am using RH7.3, GNOME and Nautilus. You can type "http://idisk.mac.com/YOUR_ACCOUNT/" in location editbox in Nautilus, and type ENTER, then you will be able to log-in into iDisk service. First you might see "cannot display" message, but, selecting "show as icon" will resolve that. After that, choose adding bookmark to put it in your bookmark list. Then, next time, Nautilus remembers that it is WebDAV access, and always you can handle that location as local folder. If you only need GRAPHICAL file manipulation, it is the easiest way, I think.
I think that the same thing happened on Sony's "Walkman" trademark in Germany several years ago. They did not defend the name enoughly, and people saw the word in dictionaries, finally Sony can never stop every portable cassette player being called "Walkman" in Germany.
Slashdot Mirror
Apple will be able to sell iPods via HP's channel, under HP logo. Then they can avoid being sued by Apple Records.
JPHB project....
Hmmmm.....SUICA is not accepted by others. Edy Card is another implementation of the same Sony's RFID card system, but, Edy card cannot be used as SUICA, or vice versa. Normally, Edy card can be used only in single convenience store chain "ampm". It is nothing convenient in fact. IC phone card is also available but it can only be used as phone card. Such single-target cards are introduced by many. And, I have several RFID cards, and more magnetic cards in my wallet now. Of course, I sometimes (frequently) juggled them and cause jammed. :-(
-- from YOKOHAMA, Japan
You're right. Reissue is available for commuter-pass type SUICA.
-- from YOKOHAMA, Japan
BTW, you don't need to worry about Big Brother-ing by railway company, but, you need to worry about CAMERA's set on EVERY road in the country. No, it is not an over-speed vehicle catcher, but, it records every license plate of the car running under that camera. And it is connected to the police station near you. Interesting, isn't it? ;-)
-- from YOKOHAMA, Japan
You're right. Prepaid-Only type SUICA does not require application form. But Commutation-type does.
The term of commutation-ticket type SUICA is still limited to 6 months. You can just renew the term without changing the card. But, renewal will not happen before its time limit nears. You cannot have such thing as 10-year effective commutation card. And, SUICA can hold cash value beside its commutation-ticket functionality, but, it is also limited to 20,000 yen. So there IS a limit of the cash we can hold into the card.
We have just saw the banner of the "SUICA's first anniversary" in JR stations. And, you're right, RFID card system is nothing new, and we're heavily learning to do our daily life with it here in Tokyo area. :-)
Non commutation type SUICA (SUICA IO card, a prepaid type), is convenient and used by some people including me. :-) And, in these days, convenience store "ampm" has "Edy card". It is the same system of SUICA. You can pay OBENTO and drinks, with Edy card. They are all based on SONY's RFID card system. Newest CLIE can read them via its integrated RF card reader.
Actually, railway company keeps record of you and that "Commutation-Card". When you purchase your "commutation ticket" in Japan, you must write your name, address and company name on the application document. And, you can get your card reissued when you lost your card, because railway company can disable lost card by its unique ID recorded on their computer. But, in current implementation, this can not truly work as a Big Brother tracking system, because the card cannot be read until it is put to the ticket-gate nearly enough (5 or 10 cm, I have heard). I don't know about the future, but, it is OK for us, for now.
-- from YOKOHAMA, JAPAN
Your talking "plastic" cards are just magnetic cards. In those days, we must insert them into the ticket gate machine. Those magnetic cards are just commutation-tickets, and the companies are just paying their commuting fares beforehand. This SUICA (I don't know what it stands for, but, in Japanese, the word "SUIKA" means "watermelon" :)) NYT is discussing, does communication to gate machines via Radio so we can go through without taking that card out from wallet. It will sometimes save great cost and time because it will never jammed. :-)
-- from YOKOHAMA, JAPAN
I am using RH7.3, GNOME and Nautilus. You can type "http://idisk.mac.com/YOUR_ACCOUNT/" in location editbox in Nautilus, and type ENTER, then you will be able to log-in into iDisk service. First you might see "cannot display" message, but, selecting "show as icon" will resolve that. After that, choose adding bookmark to put it in your bookmark list. Then, next time, Nautilus remembers that it is WebDAV access, and always you can handle that location as local folder. If you only need GRAPHICAL file manipulation, it is the easiest way, I think.
I think that the same thing happened on Sony's "Walkman" trademark in Germany several years ago. They did not defend the name enoughly, and people saw the word in dictionaries, finally Sony can never stop every portable cassette player being called "Walkman" in Germany.