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will agree that necessity is the mother of invention. I disagree. It's frustration. What better way to cure frustration than with a little bit of technology. Now for the third option. You pull out your smartphone, open up the Tile app, select the icon for your keys and are greeted with a circular indi- cator of how close you are to them. Al- ternatively, you can have the Tile make a sound so you can trace your keys that way. Using the Bluetooth functionality of your phone and its approximate 100- foot range this gadget is seriously useful. Even for finding your keys when you lose them on the aforementioned beach. But, this is only half of its functionality. Te other bit would be the communi-


ty-driven network of Tile users; for ex- ample, imagine you are sitting in a coffee shop, reading some ebooks, and you go to grab a napkin. You get back to your table and your tablet is gone. Fortunately, you stuck a Tile to the back, and now it's broadcasting its Bluetooth signal 100 feet in all directions.


Any Tile app user that passes in the vi-


cinity of your Tile will pick up its signal, and upload the information to the cloud servers which then send you a notifica- tion letting you know the area where the app picked up your Tile's signal. For the $20 price tag, it really does seem to be worth getting. Of course, there is always a catch. With this being an electronic device, it requires power of some sort. In Tile's case it is


in the way of a small watch style battery located in the sealed device. However, this is not a simple battery


Don’t leave home without it.


replacement. Tile is also a subscription- type service. After a year, your Tile will need to be renewed (speculating this is due to the battery issue). You will need to return the old one, pay the $20 fee, and get a new one. Fortunately, there are other options. Tile may have been the first, but they aren’t the only. Other notable lost and found tags include the Pebblebee, which has a replaceable bat- tery and a multi-function button to trig- ger smartphone cameras. It does have less network user features, but still has the ability to reverse your search and find your lost phone. Whichever you choose, if you are a fre- quent traveller, or like me, a person who loses their keys so much you wear them around your neck, these devices should pay for themselves in a very short time. For now, my Tile is telling me the waiter I tagged with one is on his way back with my umbrella drink.


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Spring 2015 • 79


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