Simple is Best

   The more technology is imbedded in your life, the more problems it causes. Take riding the subway today. In Philadelphia, for the last 8 years the method of payment for the subway is the Septa Key Card. A debt card, that you have to pay for, then load an amount of money onto it to pay fares. Sounds reasonably  simple, doesn't it? Well it isn't. The payment system goes down, cards decided to stop working for no reason, turnstiles lockup, cards are easily damaged, the cards expire and you're forced to buy a new one, you have to load the cards using another credit card, and a host of other issues. And my worst nightmare, somebody took my credit card payment information from Septa's website and tried to purchase a dozen iPhones. All of this never happened with the payment system that was used for many decades. The token.

   The simple technology free token. No stolen information, can't be damaged and lasted forever, were easy to buy and even find on the ground, made the crowds go faster thru the turnstiles, if you lost one it was no big deal compared to losing a single card with all your fare money on it. The token just worked and the demise of it was the perfect example of fixing something that wasn't broken.

Septa is slowly transitioning the system so you can just tap your credit card. That's an accident waiting to happen.


My last Septa Token and New York City Token.