Making a digital Catalog for your business card contacts with the business card reader
Posted 09/03/09
A business card reader is a scanner cum management system that can read and automatically process the information in visiting cards to digitally store the information in its proper corresponding field. The contact details on the card, such as the name, title, company, address, city, state, zip, country, phone, fax, mobile, email, and web address are all automatically stored for easy referencing digitally. A business card reader employs advanced OCR (Optical Character Reader) technology to identify the information on the business card in order to accurately file the text under the relevant heads. It is, thus, a very effective tool for storing and managing one's contact information.Contrary to what might appear at first thought, a business card reader is still not redundant in this age of smart phones and personal digital assistants. A business card is a faster way of providing contact details than having to narrate it out while another person manually stores it on a cell phone. Furthermore, exchanging business cards is still a means of social formality. Of course, they may easily get lost or misplaced. The advantage of being able to upload one in electrical format is immeasurable. But as mentioned before, it simply is not feasible to have to individually make entries into a computer or cell phone for every contact detail that a business card affords.
The ideal solution is the business card reader; a device that would automatically carry out this burdensome task. Of course, optical character readers are a dime a dozen nowadays, and even handwriting can be converted into digital format with a high level of accuracy. But what sets the business card reader apart from them is the fact that not only does it detect the data, it also analyzes and processes it and files it under the appropriate fields without any human assistance.
It hardly needs to be pointed out that business cards have almost become redundant. In fact, if the relevant information is previously stored on a cell phone, it can be messaged effectively to create a comprehensive contact listing on another's phone as well. But practicality is not the only consideration here; its importance stems from its status as a courteous social custom. The business card reader, thus, serves to bridge the two worlds. It honors the survivor of the past while ensuring that it does not become a handicap to the present as well.
A business card reader permits one to retain the fashionable dignity of the past, even in the modern age. However, it should by no means be regarded as a replacement for today's far more efficient personal digital assistants, but rather as an extra equipment to be used alongside them. As we step into the future, the whole concept of calling cards will one day become obsolete and cease to exist thanks to the digital revolution, but for today, at least, we are still in the process of stepping into the future rather than having reached there already, and this device is a symbol of the needs of such changing times without leaning excessively in either direction. Until that day arrives when the past is forgotten in entirety, the business card reader will continue to find its uses, if nothing else, to remind us of how things once were.