Google Making More Wallet Progress

OK, now things are getting even better.

Remember Google Checkout? That's a way you can consolidate your purchasing information into a single credential that you could use at a wide range of e-commerce web sites. I'm no expert and haven't used it before, but it seems like a good idea but nothing that's too earth-shaking.


Remember Google Wallet? It was a way you could consolidate your purchasing information into your cell phone.

Now Google is putting the two of them together and replacing Google Checkout with Google Wallet. Anybody who had agreed to accept Google Checkout is automatically transitioned to Google Wallet.

I mean, think about it... I wouldn't want to use a separate payment method online and in real life (oh, wait; I do that right now with PayPal feeding my debilitating addiction to art deco clocks from the 1930s. I don't use the PayPal account for anything else. Pity)

Understanding the Vision 
Google's move means that we're moving closer still to the mobile wallet replacing the leather wallet. Rather than having separate operations serving the online and in-person purchase, having a single entity handle both kinds of payments is more like the way we use the credit and debit cards in our own wallets.

What about Privacy?
Well, there is the privacy thing. You have to remember Google makes its money from advertising and its ads are successful because of targeting... targeting that comes from knowing so much about you. When you unify all your purchasing, you're also providing all your entire purchase history -- online and real life -- to Google. It's important to remember with companies like Google (and Facebook) that you are NOT the customer... you are the product. And the more information you willingly provide, the more valuable you are as an advertising target.

Google Wallet Looking More and More Like a Wallet

Ever since the first report I wrote about mobile wallets in 2006, I had identified as the key obstacle competition among the players, especially competition based on the technology.

In Japan, all the mobile operators unified under a single trade name (osaifu-keitai, or wallet phone), even thought it was originated by one of the major mobile operators, NTT DoCoMo. All three operators also adopted the same technology, the near-field communication variant called FeliCa. 

In the US, heavy competition and a hands-off approach by regulatory bodies had caused many delays or the death of some new, interesting technologies (remember AM Stereo? I didn't think so).

These will be getting thinner and thinner

However, an announcement last week shows that there's more cooperation than competition among the key players for mobile wallet (and ultimately, mobile payments): VISA and Google have agreed to put VISA's PayWave technology and brand name in Google Wallet phones. 

PayWave cards and dongles are already offered through a number of issuing banks including BarclayCard, BB&T, Chase, PNC, Wells Fargo and others. 

Hey, prospects for mobile wallet are getting better, aren't they?

You bet they are. The things I believe are going to be required to push the entire market forward are the open wallet concept, rather than the closed system initially proposed - and abandoned - by Isis. For the ultimate success, mobile wallet is going to have to replace everything you now keep in your leather wallet: ID, gym membership, loyalty cards, all your credit and debit cards, library card, pictures of the kids and all the other things. And only after ALL those things are possible will the mobile payments component of the mobile wallet be ready for its inevitable success.