The major US and Japanese companies in the market have agreed a standard for credit card-sized memory cards for portable computers: In the future you may be able to stick an IC card into a vending machine and choose the magazine you want, says Akihide Sei of the Japan Electronic Industry Development Association told Associated Press – the vending machine will transfer that magazine into the IC card, and you can plug it back into your laptop computer and read the magazine on the screen while you’re commuting to work; cards will appear with 4Mb memory this year, rising to 40Mb within four years; the standard was developed by the Japanese Electronic Association and the US Personal Computer Memory Card International Association, which includes all of the leading players.
