People lose their keys - a lot. Hence the wide array of key finders popping up on crowd funding websites. Most of them are cool looking like Tile or bright like Nokia's Treasure Tag, but none of them offer any other functionality. They are just key finders. There's a lot more to the new Indiegogo crowd funding project, Wise Button, than there is to these other gadgets.
Wise Button hopes to be "your universal remote control and tracking device," or so the tag line says, but there's actually a lot of interesting stuff going on with Wise Button. First off, it has a nice design. Wise Button looks like a cute, colorful, modern pocket-watch. It's a round circle, with a clock-like face, attached to a loop that you can strap around your wrist or anything else, really. The face has a power button in the middle, a camera button at 12 o'clock, a search button at 6 o'clock and back as well as forward buttons at 9 and 3 o'clock respectively.
The round face measures just 35-millimeters across and its depth is only 7-millimeters. The total length - strap included - of Wise Button is 90-millimeters. Wise Button comes in green, blue, yellow, red or white and all the shades are very vibrant. Premium black Wise Buttons with gold-toned accents are also available. It's designed to work for one month on a single charge and once it runs out of juice, you can charge it via micro USB. Tile, on the other hand, cannot be charged.
The Wise Button acts like a tracking device as well as a remote control for your other devices. Using Bluetooth signals, Wise Button can find any other object it is connected to from as far as 20 feet away, just like any other key finder. It's Wise Button's other functions that make it interesting. Wise Button also allows you to change the songs playing on your smartphone, tablet or connected speaker remotely with the back and forward buttons on its face. You can use these same buttons while showing a slide-show presentation. Wise Button can also pause your videos for you, while you run to get the popcorn.
The camera button on the device's face allows you to tell your smartphone, tablet or connected camera to take a picture, so no more failing timers or rushed photos.
The startup is also offering Wise Button Stickers, which are tiny, Bluetooth-connected tags you can put on anything you think you might lose - the family cat, remote control, smartphone, keys, etc. These stickers are equally small and rechargeable via micro USB once they run out of power after three months of use. The stickers also come in the same bright colors as Wise Button. Once you've put the sticker on an object, Wise Button will help you find it. The company will also have a companion app to help you keep track of your stickered devices.
Wise Button has already exceeded its fund raising goals and expects to ship the gadgets by June 2014. Right now, a $35 donation will get you two stickers or a Wise Button, while $70 will get you a fancy VIP Wise Button and two stickers.
