This Tiny Tracking Device Will Ensure You Never Leave Your Purse At The Bar Again
Once upon a time, the best thing we had to track our lost items was a bulky As Seen on TV keychain that could only detect items up to 60 feet away.
Tile is the modern-day equivalent of this informercial relic. The slim plastic square is designed to hook onto your valuables—either key-chain style or through an adhesive—and allow you to track the distance and location of them through your phone. The little piece of plastic also contains a speaker, which means you can make it beep to find it faster.
The company’s cloud-based platform allows you to share the location of your tiles with others (something very necessary, if, say, your roommate is constantly misplacing your car keys). And If something goes missing beyond the confines of your household, you can mark it as lost, and alert all other tile users. If someone comes within range of your item, a “discreet” message will be sent to you, identifying the location of your item.
Though still a prototype whose fate will be decided mostly by community participation, Tile seems a promising way to help us forgetful humans during our most absentminded and least sober moments. So far it has about 49,568 backers, and $2,681,287 worth of pre-ordered units for summer 2014. Half of those backers have lost their wallet in a bar. (Kidding!)
Tiles come in four different packages, starting at one for $19.95. The catch? It only lasts for a year. And who knows, by then tech-savvy bike thieves, sneaky siblings, or maybe even the NSA will have probably caught on by then.
