Bitcoin laundrymat

[MoonShadow]

It suddenly occured to me, while I was trying to get my work clothes washed while at work (mildly hazardous environment means that work clothes never go home to intermingle with family clothes, but company only supplies one washer and dryer per business unit, so I had to find out who left his clothes in the washer for the past four hours) that a laundrymat that uses bitcoins instead of quarters could be lower maintaince and lower initial costs than the current coin operated type.  The coin acceptance devices that are added to the washers and dryers are fairly expensive due to complexity, and subject to mechanical failures.  However, all that it really takes to control the washer or dryer is a set of contacts in line with the start/run circut and perhaps a small display to impart information such as credit and time remaining.  These are simple requirements in line with the smallest of microcontrollers, or a central server could control an entire room full of such machines.

The same could be applied to just about any coin operated automated exchange process, such as a vending machine; but a vending machine is vastly more complex and likely cannot completely replace the coin acceptance with Bitcoin.  Less complicated machines could completely replace the coins with Bitcoin and reduce the overhead in the same way that some large video arcades went to swipe-cards or rfid cards for similar reasons.

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[Red]

There was a thread on arduino that fits this use case nicely.

[cryptofo]

Yes, this is exactly where I was going with the bringing up the Arduino suggestion.  I posted a link to a video on the arduino thread, but I'll post it again.  It's a bit juvenile, but totally related.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPACENmInls   

I have some other ideas, but we need the arduino library to interface with the bitcoin api first.

[MoonShadow]

We would also need to come up with a convient and 'stupid resistant' method of getting the laundrymat's address(es) into the user's smartphone client.  Perhaps using the IP address method over a provided wi-fi connection to allow the user to select the particular washer/dryer/video game from a numbered list.  Perhaps it's time to have a protocol name for html/xtml; so that direct links can be created within a webpage that, once clicked, directly imports an address and description directly to the client.

[TTBit]

[MoonShadow]

What would that do for this idea?

[nelisky]

What would that do for this idea?

http://qrcode.kaywa.com/ with which you can encode strings and urls and the like, and finding a reader for mobile phones with webcams is really easy. Maybe we could even develop a specific app for doing that, paying bitcoins to addresses captured using qrcode or another 2d barcode schema, by passing the address to mybitcoin or something.

It could take bitcoins to the outside world (literally), people!

[cryptofo]

http://www.opensourcecurrency.org/2009/01/qr-codes.html

[jgarzik]

QR-codes were used in this source-code-provided example, bitcoin electronic check standard

[ichi]

I read "Bitcoin laundrymat" in an entirely-different sense 

What industry, creighto (if I may ask)?  Many years ago, I worked in the quality-control lab at a chemical plant.  Although production workers didn't take their clothes home, and had to shower before leaving, that wasn't always enough.  There was this guy I'd occasionally see, clocking out, who was orange    I got that his job included cleaning dye storage bins, and that some of the dyes were quite hydrophobic.  They were probably also carcinogenic    And hey, biphenyl was one of the products I tested    Chloracne, anyone?

[I just had to share that.]

[MoonShadow]

I read "Bitcoin laundrymat" in an entirely-different sense 

What industry, creighto (if I may ask)? 

I'm sorry, but I don't think that I should use too many details.  We don't have anything along those lines, anymore, anyway.  The laundry facilities, and employee showers, are mostly a throwback to those days; but there are more benign alternatives for what we need these days.

[mizerydearia]

It suddenly occured to me, while I was trying to get my work clothes washed while at work (mildly hazardous environment means that work clothes never go home to intermingle with family clothes, but company only supplies one washer and dryer per business unit, so I had to find out who left his clothes in the washer for the past four hours) that a laundrymat that uses bitcoins instead of quarters could be lower maintaince and lower initial costs than the current coin operated type.  The coin acceptance devices that are added to the washers and dryers are fairly expensive due to complexity, and subject to mechanical failures.  However, all that it really takes to control the washer or dryer is a set of contacts in line with the start/run circut and perhaps a small display to impart information such as credit and time remaining.  These are simple requirements in line with the smallest of microcontrollers, or a central server could control an entire room full of such machines.

The same could be applied to just about any coin operated automated exchange process, such as a vending machine; but a vending machine is vastly more complex and likely cannot completely replace the coin acceptance with Bitcoin.  Less complicated machines could completely replace the coins with Bitcoin and reduce the overhead in the same way that some large video arcades went to swipe-cards or rfid cards for similar reasons.

This should be easy to implement!
http://hackaday.com/2009/01/02/twittering-washing-machine/

Soon instead of

If you don’t have at least one twittering appliance in your household, you’re getting behind.

there will be

If you don’t have at least one bitcoin appliance in your household, you’re getting behind.

However, additionally, Bitcoin could also integrate with twitter in the sense that once a Bitcoin transaction occurs/is confirmed, then a tweet could be produced to trigger the washer/dryer units

There would be too much of a delay to wait for confirmation from the network.  For speed, the transaction would have to occur much like the IP transaction works, with the receiving node getting a copy of the transaction for itself to check against it's own copy of the blockchain immeditately.

True.


Additionally, it would be better to modify existing devices to provide this type of functionality than to buy devices that are designed to provide the integration, primarily for cost and also due to not all styles/colors/etc will be available as would be if you modified your existing devices.

Perhaps there could be an organization to establish that provides this type of service of modifying devices to integrate with Bitcoin?

In regards to laundrymats, this organization/business idea could potentially be very successful if it were to revolutionize the laundrymat industry.

[MoonShadow]

However, additionally, Bitcoin could also integrate with twitter in the sense that once a Bitcoin transaction occurs/is confirmed, then a tweet could be produced to trigger the washer/dryer units

There would be too much of a delay to wait for confirmation from the network.  For speed, the transaction would have to occur much like the IP transaction works, with the receiving node getting a copy of the transaction for itself to check against it's own copy of the blockchain immeditately.

[Red]

There would be too much of a delay to wait for confirmation from the network.  For speed, the transaction would have to occur much like the IP transaction works, with the receiving node getting a copy of the transaction for itself to check against it's own copy of the blockchain immeditately.

It's a pretty cool use case. I don't expect there will be much *generalized* fraud if the machine did its own validation. I mean I doubt somebody standing there in the laundromat with a basket of dirty clothes is also simultaneously trying to double spend those coins by buying a tropical fish.

However, it is probably worth defending against the case where someone is trying to double/triple spend to start multiple machines at once. That should be pretty easy to defend against though, since all machines are likely on the same network.

[Anonymous]

You could send a bitcoin payment to a remote webcam.

I dont think I need to go into the details of what the purpose would be.....


 

[MoonShadow]

There would be too much of a delay to wait for confirmation from the network.  For speed, the transaction would have to occur much like the IP transaction works, with the receiving node getting a copy of the transaction for itself to check against it's own copy of the blockchain immeditately.

It's a pretty cool use case. I don't expect there will be much *generalized* fraud if the machine did its own validation. I mean I doubt somebody standing there in the laundromat with a basket of dirty clothes is also simultaneously trying to double spend those coins by buying a tropical fish.

However, it is probably worth defending against the case where someone is trying to double/triple spend to start multiple machines at once. That should be pretty easy to defend against though, since all machines are likely on the same network.

I think that I was unclear.  I wasn't talking about prevention of fraud, I was talking about the delay in the propogation of the transactions themselves.  Currently things tend to move pretty fast, but there are sometimes delays even now.  Eventually every transaction makes it across the entire network and into a block, but the time delay can be expected to increase as the size of the network increases.  So there needs to be a quick way to get the transaction from the spender to the client of the laundrymat in a hurry, so that one doesn't have to wait to start the dryer or play a round on a video game.  Even a delay of 10-20 seconds would annoy.

[MoonShadow]

You could send a bitcoin payment to a remote webcam.

I dont think I need to go into the details of what the purpose would be.....

Checking the traffic on the interstate? 

[Insti]

I think that I was unclear.  I wasn't talking about prevention of fraud, I was talking about the delay in the propogation of the transactions themselves.  Currently things tend to move pretty fast, but there are sometimes delays even now.  Eventually every transaction makes it across the entire network and into a block, but the time delay can be expected to increase as the size of the network increases.  So there needs to be a quick way to get the transaction from the spender to the client of the laundrymat in a hurry, so that one doesn't have to wait to start the dryer or play a round on a video game.  Even a delay of 10-20 seconds would annoy.

That's a pretty slow network you're connected to.
You can always just send your transaction direct to the washing machine by bluetooth or something if you want.

[MoonShadow]

I think that I was unclear.  I wasn't talking about prevention of fraud, I was talking about the delay in the propogation of the transactions themselves.  Currently things tend to move pretty fast, but there are sometimes delays even now.  Eventually every transaction makes it across the entire network and into a block, but the time delay can be expected to increase as the size of the network increases.  So there needs to be a quick way to get the transaction from the spender to the client of the laundrymat in a hurry, so that one doesn't have to wait to start the dryer or play a round on a video game.  Even a delay of 10-20 seconds would annoy.

That's a pretty slow network you're connected to.

Sometimes.  I don't think that I'm unusual.

You can always just send your transaction direct to the washing machine by bluetooth or something if you want.

That is exactly what I was talking about.

[FreeMoney]

Guys, I've been talking to the Zeitgeist people and they make a lot of sense. The machine is already there, and water and power should obviously be free so I don't think this Bitcoin thing is a good idea.