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Environmentally Friendly Intelligent Lounge Chair

Written by / journalist stationed abraod Li Qing

There are multi-functional intelligent lounge chairs in Boston Common and the White House， which not only provide rest space for the public， but also charge the phones. This kind of chair is called Soofa， a word similar to sofa， and is invented by a new company separated from MIT Media Lab. Solar energy conversion device is mounted on Soofa， which can convert solar energy into electrical energy and store it. People passing through can charge their mobile phones and tablet PCs via USB interface on the device. Some people have concerns about the safety of the charger， and worry about the hackers attacking the visitors' phones through the chargers' interfaces. However， the person in charge of the company has said that the design of the charger is very safe because the charging port is located in a firm box so that only the company's staff can open the security screws. If someone tries to open these screws forcibly， the charger will automatically power off.

Besides， Soofa has built-in computer so that it can collect urban environment related data， such as local air quality， noise level， sunlight intensity and flow of passed crowd， etc. The information collected is sent to the Internet via wireless transmission equipment， which can provide data support for improving the living environment of a city. However， at the moment， cost of Soofa is much more expensive than conventional wooden or metal chairs， and there is no existing business model.