Tom Morris pointed me to this interesting discussion about using Wikipedia QR codes in museums. I think it's an excellent idea. It's something I've briefly discussed with Cristianno Betta for his 100 Objects project. There are five key points to the success of such a scheme. 100% of visitors will be scanning these codes on their mobile phones. The code must point to the mobile version of Wikipedia. <100% of visitors will speak the language of the country where the museum is located …
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Last year I gave a presentation at PayPal to show how charities could harness QR codes. I'm not sure if Oxfam were in the audience that day. But if they were, they missed the point. QR codes are a solution for quick interactions with mobile phones. Let's investigate the Oxfam QR code seen in Metro. The Advert So, can donate by scanning the code? Well, it's not really made clear what the QR code is for. There's no text associated with it. The Code Let's take a closer look at the code. …
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Another day in London - another sighting of a QR code! This time, on a poster for high-brow art-house flick The Mechanic. Quite close to the bottom of the poster - so low, I had to kneel to scan it - is a QR code. Scan it and it takes you a mobile friendly trailer on YouTube. Issues It wouldn't be a Terence Eden blog post if I didn't criticise the approach taken by the advertisers. QR code is far too low down - who wants to stoop to scan (other than nerds like me)? No call to…
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Updated! 2011-01-11 20:00 - see the response from the Metro. The Metro is a London-based UK newspaper national newspaper which is distributed in 33 cities across the UK. Around a year ago, I reviewed the Metro's mobile website. It wass a perfectly fine mobile site and I'm pleased to see that over the last 12 months it has undergone substantial improvements. You can visit it at http://metro.mobi/ This morning, I spotted this prominent QR code - placed on page 2 of the paper. Photo by…
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After the derisory efforts of Waitrose to properly utilise QR codes, it's disheartening to see Debenhams make a brand new mistake. At the bottom of tonight's Evening Standard is this advert from Debenhams. Debenhams QR Advert The QR code immediately caught my eye and - being the saddo that I am - I immediatley whipped out ZXing and scanned it in. Debenhams QR Code What goodies would it net me? A URL to visit their mobile site? Contact details for a Christmas order line? …
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What a joy for fans of 2D codes. London's freesheet "Metro" has adverts with two different styles of 2D codes on pages 14 and 15. In the left corner - John Lewis sporting a QR Code. In the right corner - the Donkey from Shrek going into battle with an MS Tag. FIGHT! QR Code This use of QR code leaves me a little conflicted. On the one hand, the code is too small and, either in resizing or printing, has become distorted. On the other hand, the code resolves to a great mobile site. …
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I don't want this to be seen as an anti-Microsoft rant. I'm a great fan of Windows Phone 7, my Microsoft 4000 keyboard is the only device I'm comfortable typing on, and my Xbox hardware is still going strong years after release. I'm also heartily impressed with Microsoft's continuing support of the Creative Commons. True, I don't use Windows at home - but I don't blindly devote my life to knocking them unfairly. But I do have serious concerns about Microsoft's attempts to enter the 2D tag…
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Spotted all over the London Underground in the last few days, these QR enabled adverts from Eastpak for their I Am The Bag campaign. Close Up of the QR Code YouTube Video The code immediately directs the user to YouTube to watch a video. Two Ways To Make The Campaign Better Use a smaller URL to create an easier to scan QR Code. Eastpak currently use http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1fBMmR103Q - they could drop the www to make it slightly smaller, or use "m." so people know they're…
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Nick Burcher has done a great job detailing Lacoste's new QR code campaign. Being the curmudgeon that I am, I want to point out a couple of rather glaring flaws in its execution. Contrast See if you can scan in the code on this image. The image links to Nick's site if you want the full resolution version. I tried several different phones and scanners and wasn't able to get the code to scan. This is because QR codes are designed to be black and white. As I've explained before, most QR…
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There seems to be a lot of talk at the moment about how marketing can make use of QR codes. I wanted to highlight a few ways in which 2D codes can be used for slightly more practical usage. There's nothing wrong with selling more cheese - but I think that only scratches the surface of these little squares of brilliance. You may have seen these Ringo.co.uk ticket machines. They are meant to be a convenient way to pay for parking tickets - but could QR codes make them more useful? The…
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One of the lovely aspects of QR codes is the variable levels of error correction built in. On even the most basic code you can obscure or deform up to 7% of the code and most readers will still decode it. This leads us in to the amusing territory of "hiding" human readable data in the code. I say "hiding" because we are hiding it from the scanner - not from the human. One of the more famous examples of this is Duncan Robertson's BBC logo. What works particularly well is the fact that the B…
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I've just come back from a delightful weekend in Paris. Delightful for me - not so for my wife. Rather than quietly admiring the artwork in the Louvre, I ran around gawping at the huge range of 2D codes on offer on the streets of Paris. There are some great examples of how to do 2D code marketing - and how not to do it. I'd like to run you through a few of examples I found. I've enhanced the photos to make the codes a bit more obvious - that should make scanning them easier. QR QR Codes…
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