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Microcap & Penny Stocks : GLOW - Global Games, Inc. - Great Profit Potential ! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Brad who wrote (277)	5/1/1998 3:30:00 PM
From: TrumpCards	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 8879

Brad, I found this on the internet the article is from 2/97 is this the same type of ECS that GLOW has?? Sounds like the Canadians love these things. Here is the link everybody canoe.ca By VALERIE LAWTON Canadian Press ÿTORONTO -- Futurists imagine a day not too far away when Canadians will have to visit a museum to get a look at loonies, toonies and $20 bills. ÿ ÿCanada may be a little step closer to turning cash into a curiosity today, when city-wide testing of so-called E-cash or electronic cash begins in Guelph, Ont. ÿ ÿ"This is definitely where we're going," said futurist Frank Feather, author of The Future Consumer. ÿ ÿPredictions vary -- and some doubt we'll ever see a cashless society -- but Feather believes cash usage will dwindle to nothing over the next 25 years. ÿ ÿ"People are attached to money psychologically, but they soon get used to the new variety," he said. "When credit cards first came out ... people used to stand around and watch people use them." ÿ ÿToday, nobody bats an eye. ÿ ÿCanadians are the world's second-largest users of plastic cards. Debit card use at stores has exploded -- about 677 million transactions worth over $26 billion last year. ÿ ÿJust around the corner are electronic cash cards. They look like credit cards but electronic cash is loaded on a computer chip embedded in the plastic. ÿ ÿHundreds of Canadians are already testing different versions and some of the country's biggest banks plan to launch cash cards nationally next year. ÿ ÿGuelph is the Canadian pilot site of the Mondex electronic cash system. Residents will be able to use Mondex cards at most stores as well as parking lots, vending machines and on city buses. ÿ ÿ"I use it for petty cash," said Debbie Parkinson, part of a small group that tested the cards at a handful of stores before today's Guelph-wide launch. ÿ ÿ"I go to the store and I buy gum," said Parkinson, a branch personal banking manager for CIBC, which along with Royal Bank hold the Canadian rights to Mondex. ÿ ÿ"At the lottery booth every week I buy my tickets with it. And coffee in the morning. ÿ ÿ"It's really quick and it's not as cumbersome (as cash) now that we have toonies and loonies and bills." ÿ ÿThe owner of a Second Cup coffee outlet says the cards are also making his life easier. ÿ ÿ"With my business and its small sales, $1.30 per coffee, that type of thing, it's fast and I can move customers along," said Paul LeRoux. ÿ ÿ"And we're not always running out of small bills -- that's one of our biggest problems, especially in the morning." ÿ ÿTesting of another cash card, Exact, began across the eastern Ontario city of Kingston in December. Visa Canada has conducted trials with Visa Cash in Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal. ÿ ÿThere's room in Canada for more than one electronic cash provider, said Pat Daley, financial services consultant with Deloitte and Touche. ÿ ÿBut it's likely that just one or two technology bases will ultimately be used, she said. That would allow merchants to accept different cards with the same machine. ÿ ÿThe potential impact of a cash card explosion has some people worried. ÿ ÿVirtually untraceable financial transactions could be a headache for law enforcement agencies -- if cybermoney cards can eventually be used for big transactions or to store large amounts of money. ÿ ÿBudget planner Peggy Waterton sees another problem -- people spend more when they pay with plastic rather than cash. ÿ ÿ"In Las Vegas, they give you chips," Waterton said. "Obviously it's easier to part with a chip than a $20 bill." ÿ ÿA Visa Cash pamphlet for merchants backs her up, noting that consumers tend to spend "between five and 40 per cent more in some merchant environments." ÿ ÿJust how popular electronic cash will be is the subject of debate -- partly because it's not clear how much merchants and consumers will pay to use them. ÿ ÿOver at the Bank of Canada, research adviser Kevin Clinton isn't worried E-cash will put the central bank out of the note-making business. ÿ ÿ"If you want to buy a hot dog from a guy on the corner, in all likelihood you're always going to have to pay in currency."