Brody, A. B., and Gottsman, E. J. Pocket bargain finder: A handheld device for augmented commerce. In HUC ’99: Proceedings of the 1st international symposium on Handheld and Ubiquitous Computing (London, UK, 1999), Springer-Verlag, pp. 44–51. [URL]

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This paper presents Pocket BargainFinder, a prototype that lets the consumer browse products in the physical world, then buy them, at the best deal, in the virtual world. The main argument of the authors was that consumers want some kind of tangible contacts with goods as they shop and that shopping agent were not able to be accessed on a mobile device.

Imagine a Saturday morning visit to your neighborhood Super Bookstore. You’re enjoying your pick from the New York Times Bestseller List, with a double mocha latte and a banana walnut muffin on the side. Light classical music wafts from the overhead speakers as you sink deeper into an oversized leather chair. The book’s a great read—you’d like to buy a copy—so you slip your Internet-connected mobile phone from your pocket and scan the barcode on the book jacket, using a compact barcode reader. In moments, price quotes appear on the phone display: an online bookstore has the book for 40 per cent less than the Super Bookstore price.