Your phone is capable of so much more, but it's being throttled by Apple and this is effecting iOS and ANDROID users alike.

Near Field Communication (NFC) is a technology that enables smartphones and other devices to establish radio communication with each other by touching them together or bringing them into proximity, typically a distance of 10 cm (3.9 in) or less.

The use for education, banking, transit, retail, and file sharing is endless, including, but not limited to, unlocking doors, making mobile payments, sharing contact information with just a touch, instantly acquiring directions, translating text, downloading songs from a touch, identifying lost animals, tagging items, and creating interactive toys and wearables. Items like this: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/600231570/283773649?token=689b210f

Which embeds a NFC chip within a pearl, creating Smart jewelry.

Sadly Apple is behind the curve on this.

Android introduced it's first NFC phone in 2010 and since then third party developers have been able to come up with a plethora of products and software that make use of the technology, slowly causing Apple to fall behind and to cut it's most faithful of user's out this burgeoning tech advancement.

Late 2014 saw the release of the iPhone 6 which includes NFC but is limited it to Apple Pay, effectively locking out developers, only making it useful to the companies they establish agreements with. This is an unfortunate mistake.

WHY DOES THIS MATTER TO APPLE USERS AND ANDROID USERS ALIKE?

Because iOS is still one of the major smartphone options and though they're "slow-to-get-on-board" mentality will undoubtedly drive people away and start to erode their standings in the cutting edge tech world, they are also holding back the ubiquity of the technology and lowering the cost efficiency to offer these technologies to developers. Once they release they're grip on this tech, it makes sense for developers to create truly spectacular products useful for all

WHETHER YOU ARE AN APPLE OR AN ANDROID USER IT BEHOOVES TO SIGN THIS PETITION.