By Tim Alper
Contributing Writer
A man in a formal suit and tie wanders across the platform at Sadang subway station in Seoul, briefcase in hand. Fellow commuters stare at him in bemusement -- the man seems to be muttering to himself.
With no mobile phone in his hand, no wires dangling from his ear, most bystanders assume he is insane. That is until they see the tiny Bluetooth earpiece he is speaking into.
Although PC literacy in Korea is almost second to none compared to the rest of the world, a lot of people here are unaware of exactly what Bluetooth technology is, or what its benefits may be.
Bluetooth uses ultra short-wave radio waves to transfer information almost instantaneously between devices. Files such as documents, pictures or even MP3s can be sent, say, from a notebook to a mobile phone in seconds.
Its major advantage over wireless Internet (Wi-Fi) forms of data transfer is its low cost and low power usage, which make it easy to market.
It also means that if you have a Bluetooth-enabled mobile phone, data transfer will not eat up your battery too much. Infra-Red, the technology used in television remote controls, was the predecessor of Bluetooth, but it is comparatively slow and impractical. Bluetooth, meanwhile, can work at higher speeds and at distances of up to 100 meters from its target.
Bluetooth’s usage, though, goes far beyond simple file transfers. Wireless headsets for mobiles or PC operators mean that communication can be simplified for those who need it the most.
Over in the U.K., where the use of a mobile phone while driving a car is now a criminal offense, drivers are using inexpensive Bluetooth hands-free headsets on the road.
This has meant there are now less traffic accidents as a result of drivers being distracted by phone calls and also that British people with cars can use their mobiles without fear of punishment.
Though users have complained that sound quality in Bluetooth headsets is mono, rather than stereo, and too poor for listening to music, it seems researchers have latched onto customers’ desire to do more than talk though their headsets.
EDR(Enhanced Data Rate) technology, which uses a much faster transfer speed, means Bluetooth chips will be able to transmit high-quality stereo sound to cable-free headsets for customers who want to listen to their phones’ built-in MP3 players.
Keyboards, printers and mouses that use Bluetooth de-clutter offices and home workspaces by eliminating the need for annoying and easily-tangled wires.
The uses of this simple technology seem to be surprisingly diverse. It was first used in commercial devices by Swedish mobile phone makers Eriksson, who released the T36 handset, the world’s first with Bluetooth as standard.
But fellow European giants Nokia, and American manufacturers Motorola started to release similar products soon after. Samsung and LG also started to develop Bluetooth handsets, but used modified chipsets bought from Europe or elsewhere in Asia, instead of developing their own, releasing the Bluetooth handsets only abroad, rather than on the domestic market.
A former software engineer at LG Electronics says that when she went on holiday to Europe, she was surprised at how many people over there use Bluetooth.
The programmer, who asked not to be named, said, “I couldn’t believe just how many uses they have put Bluetooth to in Europe.
I couldn’t help asking myself why we are not doing things like this in Korea.” She went on to say that often Bluetooth products made for the domestic market are not made to high enough standards. She said, “Bluetooth is undeveloped here and some products don’t work well enough to be used.
The quality is worse than it is in Europe. A lot of these products fail independent laboratory tests.” Cho Jae-wook, a technical researcher at phone makers Pantech Curitel, agrees that Korea is playing catch-up with Europe on this issue.
“Europeans developed the original technology, so the continent is naturally better disposed for using Bluetooth than we are in Korea,” he says. However, while companies in Europe have been searching for new and more inventive ways to use Bluetooth, Korean research into this technology has been much slower.
Analysts say that while Koreans are now slowly starting to introduce Bluetooth into mobile devices here, European companies are already looking for new ways to use the technology.
Cho says, “Europe has applied Bluetooth technology into real life. It’s not just wireless technology, but you can expect to see Bluetooth being used there for things like public transport and vending machines in the next few years.”
Korean companies are starting to cotton on to the fact that there is a major discrepancy here. Lee Ki-tae, chief executive of Samsung Electronics, says, “Samsung is making every effort to develop Bluetooth headsets.”
And a spokeswoman for Samsung said that a special Bluetooth task force called the Mobile Applied Business Team has been set up by the communication giants. She said, “The purpose of the new team is to investigate ways to invade the international Internet market and strengthen Samsung’s Bluetooth market share.”
Song Sang-hyun, a Bluetooth researcher for KorWin, a Korean wireless communications company, says the problem is that Koreans have still to learn the benefits of Bluetooth.
“Many people in Korea don’t know the first thing about Bluetooth, and those that do have seldom considered its advantages. People in this country think they don’t need this technology, but that is usually because they have never used it. If they use it once, they will want more.
They will soon want devices with this function as standard.”