On October 28, 2010, I attended and presented at OpenBeta5 at the Co-Working Collaborative (OKC CoCo) in Oklahoma City.
Prior to the start of the lightning talks, David Glover took a few minutes to explain and demonstrate the amazing SQUARE device which permits anyone with an iPad, iPhone, or iPod Touch to take credit card payments. This is the Square in my hand. This amazing invention plugs into the headphone jack of any iOS device, and works with free software. A small fee (less than many alternatives, and contract-free) is charged for each credit card swipe. The charge is greater if you don’t swipe but key in the credit card information.
Check out this two minute video interview with David for an overview.
Visit squareup.com to sign up and start using Square. The Square device itself is free. Learn more background about Square in this 10 November 2010 ZDNet article, “125 million iOS devices morph into credit card terminals.” According to the article:
Square handles the processing and payments and takes 2.75% (swiped) or 3.5% (keyed) plus a 15 cent fee per transaction. The service is really taking off and is now processing millions of dollars in mobile transactions every week.
I’m considering using the Square personally for book sales once I get my first one published via Bookbrewer, hopefully later this year! 🙂
Thanks to David Glover for sharing the Square with me and others at OpenBeta5! This is really amazing technology! David is a pretty amazing fellow himself, his website is Flying Humans LLC. I’ve found lots of interesting people hang out at the OKCCoCo! David was my partner for PowerPoint Karaoke later in the evening at OpenBeta. We didn’t win any prizes, but it certainly was fun!
Technorati Tags:
economics, ios, ipad, iphone, ipod, touch, square, credit, card, commerce, swipe, payment
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Square just recently came out with a program for the Android platform as well. It is limited to use on the Motorola Droid and Droid X, HTC Nexus One, Droid Incredible, Evo, Desire and Hero (with 2.x update), Samsung Galaxy S series and Intercept and LG Ally.
This information was taken from: https://squareup.com/get-started
Square is actually pretty expensive. Take a traditional merchant account where you can get a debit card for just 1.29% vs 2.75% for square. If you only process $500 a month square may be a good option otherwise a traditional merchant account will save you more money. Be sure to stay clear of contracts or set up fees.