IPEXPO and the Unscannable QR Code

Terence Eden — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 17:56:09 +0000

I recently overheard two advertising executives discussing their latest QR campaign. I jotted down what they were saying...

Dave! Dave! I've got a brilliant idea!
What is it, Fred?
Let's make a QR code... right... but make it really hard to scan!
Brilliant idea, Fred! How?
We can stick it on a Taxi, so that you have to wait until it stops at a traffic light before you can scan it!
Ok, Fred, but I'm still concerned that the code will be too easy to scan.
Aha! That's why we invert the colours!
Fred, you're a genius. Let's go and club some baby seals to death.

I... just.... WHAT?

Did no one test this campaign? It's completely unreadable on the half dozen QR scanners I tried. Perhaps there is a mythical phone which can render it, but I doubt it. The campaign (for an event in October 2011) had a total of fifteen clicks.

Of those clicks, only 10 were from the QR code. Ten!

I took the liberty of inverting the code back to the correct colour layout. Unsurprisingly for such a hopeless code, IPEXPO's website isn't mobile friendly.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to bang my head against a brick wall.

If you need a professional QR code consultation - please contact me. PLEASE!

#ipexpo – Terence Eden’s Blog

IPEXPO and the Unscannable QR Code