This Wednesday April 21st, I will be attending the Augmented Reality Conference. A one day part of the Emerging Communications Conference at the Airport Marriott in San Francisco, CA.

The AR Conference is the world’s first and largest commercial augmented reality event. Industry leaders will be sharing their expertise on a variety of AR related subjects. Topics range from a presentation on crowd sourced traffic apps by Di-Ann Eisnor, Community Geographer, of Waze to the applying the advancement of desktop applications to the future of mobile AR, presented by Blake Callens, Senior Software Engineer at Zugara.

This conference is going to be a place where the future of the marketplace will be molded. The advancement of AR is changing the way that consumers experience their products and promotions. As with other industries in the past few years AR is helping to put the power back in the consumer’s hands. When the consumer decides how and when they experience a promotion the relationship is enhanced.

Other industry leaders presenting will be Bruno Uzzan of Total Immersion, Peter Meier of Metaio, Dana Farbo of Acrossair, and Mark Rolston of Frog Design. Take a look at the full schedule here.

Keep up on the AR Conference news throughout the day on Wednesday by following hashtag #arconf on Twitter. I will also be providing updates on the sessions via Twitter. You can follow me @mdusing.

When it comes to retailers embracing new technology Target® is working to stay top. With the latest version of Target’s iPhone app the retailer shows just how serious they can be about shopping with technology.

One of the biggest advancements in version 3.3 is the addition of a barcode scanner. Powered by Occipital a Boulder, CO based app developer. The barcode scanner allows guests to build shopping lists (TargetLists) and price items right in the aisle. TargetLists include managing wedding or baby registries, wish lists and daily shopping items. Scan any item in stores and access the product details, reviews and store availability.

With 3.3 Target brings you Daily Deals. Much like Amazon’s Gold Box Deals, each day Target offers special discounts available only for a limited time. The deals are available through online ordering only but do include free shipping.

And lastly Target makes it easier for their guests to ask questions with contact us and feedback features. Way to go Target! When retailers take the time to innovate and listen to their guests sales improve and the relationship grows. iPhone users told Target how they wanted to use their app and Target has shown they can listen.

Visit Target app on iTunes or text “APP” to 827438 (TARGET) to receive a download link.

Man the folks over at Waze have been pretty busy. What is Waze you ask? Well it’s a user-generated mapping application for the iPhone, Andriod phones, and even Windows Mobile phones. The interesting part is the social interaction in the app. Some very smart people have been enriching mapping content. The best part is the app is FREE.

The Waze team originates from Isreal. Where thier app created maps of the roads from their users driving. No base map was used. User data created all the roads. The value of crowd-sourced data is amazing. Di-Ann from Waze states that roads in Italy were mapped in only 10 days by users. Users are deemed Wazers.

As for features, there are turn-by-turn directions, traffic flow, speed traps, even a live ETA for your trip. Join in by reporting speed traps, accidents, and construction. Wazers driving on new roads can hit the record road button and upload new roads to the Waze database. Of course all this comes with the general caveat that Waze’s app is only as good as the data from all their Wazers. So join today and improve the experience for all.

What makes mapping even more fun? Games! Waze has gaming features built-in. wazers can munch pellets like Pacman and earn points. Other goodies including cherries and hammers appear on the map as well. Check out the Waze blog where you can earn prizes during special promotions: http://www.waze.com/blog/

Pros:
Don’t get stuck in traffic
GPS based for accuracy
Inaccuracies are reported and fixed by users
Typing is disabled while in motion for Safety
Makes driving fun with game integration
Side roads are added (anywhere Wazers go)

Cons:
GPS based so battery drain happens
For safest use the driver needs a passenger

Check out these videos for more information and take a look into the future of Waze:
Click “OK” to begin.

Yesterday at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain Microsoft introduced their next offering to the mobile OS platform. Windows Phone 7 Series. And I do have to say the design looks impressive.

Microsoft has taken a step back and started to innovate. They’ve looked at phones as a different kind of platform a small platform not a mini PC. Geometric design which has a clean simple look, using grey, blue, and white with the integration of photos. Also using green to delineate games and cue to Xbox. Meant to deliver a task oriented experience as opposed to an application focused approach.

On a hardware note three buttons will be featured on all Windows Phone 7 Series hardware: Start, Search, and Back. Hardware will also always have a touch screen. The lock screen slides up; wouldn’t this be a problem putting the phone in your pocket? The homescreen/start experience features live tiles which update with information from the internet and exchange. The tiles are also referred to as hubs. The tiles are People, Calendars, Pictures, Outlook, Office, Games, Web pages, and Individuals. Described as destinations or hubs for an integrated experience by larger categories rather than application specific.

People

Contacts are filed together Recent people, All people (windows live, online e-mail services, Facebook), and a What’s New category. Keyboard features a face button for all your emoji in their original text only form. Also on a nice humorous note you delete an tile for a person by touching a broken heart icon to severe ties.

Calendar

Work and home events featured are together in your calendar. The calendar has Day, Agenda and Month views. Locations are built in with the Bing map service. As you zoom in on the map closer to the ground it automatically goes from graphic data to satellite photo data (aerial view).

Bing

When searching you see web, local, and image result categories. In a humorous choice of demonstration; the search example used was “Sushi” same as with Apple’s iPhone demos. Also featured in the results for each restaurant will be reviews via partnerships with other companies like Yelp. The browser is based on desktop version of IE; using sub-pixel positioning to make web pages appear with greater clarity.

Pictures

Categories include Gallery, Albums, and What’s New (your friend’s photo activity). Direct uploading to Facebook from phone. Syncing of photos from Windows Live and Facebook.

Outlook

Categories include Unread, Flags, Urgent, and All. The interface is clean with check boxes next to e-mails making it easy to delete multiples similar to on the iPhone edit mode.

Office

For productivity Office includes One Note, Documents, and SharePoint categories. Take notes on your phone or computer in text, photo, or voice memo formats. Documents for viewing on the go. SharePoint for consumption on a variety of devices as well as editing on the go.

Games

Categories here include Spotlight, Xbox Live, Requests, and Collections. Spotlight posts announcements about games and your gaming activity as well as your friend’s. Multi-player gaming with other phones, PCs and even Xbox devices is said to be supported.

Music/Video

Every phone will be a Zune. Categories here include Music, Video, Podcast, Radio, and the Marketplace. Music features History and New for easy access to what you were last listening to or recently upload tunes. Pin content to have it appear in a separate category (somewhat like favoring an album or song).

Zune software for syncing. Very iPhone like experience on the device tab. Bar graphic of space on phone and content. Last sync listing and device graphic.

Hardware partners include Qualcomm, LG, Samsung, Garmin/Asus, HTC, HP, DELL, Sony Ericsson, and Toshiba.
Carrier partners will include T-Mobile, Telefonica, Sprint, Vodafone, AT&T, Orange, SFR, Verizon, Telstra, and Telecom.

Taking a stab at Apple and the iPhone by changing the focus from apps to a phone experience with hubs meant to work together. A glance and go experience versus the in and out experience of apps. Not sure I buy that. It’s pretty much the same thing said in a different way.

With all that said the bottom line seems to be a new UI with a spin on the phone experience. As for NEW features the Xbox Live integration is the main add over other phones. We will see if the Windows Phone 7 Series will prove to be a step forward or simply another player in the market.

Augmented reality has hit the mainstream. The first AR app to make it to the iPhone app store was Metro Paris Subway by French developer PresseLite. Unfortunately you need to be in Paris to experience the AR features of the app.

Lucky for us, with the latest release of Yelp you can experience augmented reality on the iPhone 3GS for yourself. Yelp is a handy location based directory app for finding restaurants, bars, banks, etc. in your area. In order to use augmented reality in the Yelp app you need enable a hidden feature called Monocle. Follow these simple steps:

1. Grab the app here, Yelp.

2. Launch it and shake your phone. You need to shake it 3 times. TUAW got it working with one good shake, while other TUAW bloggers needed more than 3.

3. A message appears indicating that you’ve activated “Monocle.” That’s what they call the AR feature.

4. A monocle button appears on the top right of the app. Press it.
( Directions provided by: www.tuaw.com )

Now its time to play. Launch the Monocle augmented reality feature by clicking the new button in the upper right corner. As you move the phone around you will see your surroundings through the iPhone camera. Pop-up style windows display nearby business in their corresponding direction related to your location.

Note: Monocle only works on the iPhone 3GS.

For a more in depth review check out this video from GearLive: