Humans have devised hundreds of thousands of languages with which to express themselves. Some, like Cornish are on the verge of extinction. Others, like Catalan and Welsh, are only used by a small number of speakers. Some, like New Norse, are created for political purposes. All these languages are valuable and hugely important to their communities. Many have a Wikipedia version written in their…
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© Caroline Mockett As I stepped onto the stage at OverTheAir 11 to present QRpedia, I was buoyed by the overwhelming reception that it received on the Interwebs over the last few days. Here's a quick roundup. It all started with a blog post on Wikimedia. ReadWriteWeb called QRpedia Probably the Coolest QR Thingy Ever Made! This was syndicated into the New York Times. Gizmodo …
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Yesterday, I paid a visit to the UK National Archives in Kew. Their amazing educational team have recently completed a stunning QRpedia installation. The Domesday Book From their press-release: As part of this project to increase digital engagement we have used the QRpedia service to link some of our museum exhibits to articles on Wikipedia. In the on site museum at Kew, visitors can use their …
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You know Jimmy Wales, right? He's the guy co-founded Wikipedia - and, possibly, its most prominent face. So, a few days ago, he popped down to The Children's Museum of Indianapolis to see the work the museum is doing with its Wikipedian in Residence - Lori Philips. What else did he do while he was there? Why, scanned some QRpedia codes! You can see all the photos of his visit on…
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While at Update Conference, I met the amazing Georgie St Clair who was modelling her spectacular QR code "info dress". She told me about her ambitious plans for a QR Code Treasure Hunt across Brighton. Working with local artists and businesses, the Brighton QR Treasure Hunt offers an interactive experience of the city that is both factual and entertaining. Your team of 2 to 6 people will go…
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A quick round up of QRpedia in the news: The New Media Consortium has produced a report entitled Technology Outlook: UK Tertiary Education. The full report (PDF) specifically mentions QRpedia Codes as "smart objects" and predicts a time-to-Adoption of four to five years. I think we can do it sooner than that, though! The report is CC-BY and well worth reading. One of our friend in…
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Update: A version of this article appears on Sophos's NakedSecurity blog Last year I blogged about how easy it would be to pay for parking via QR code. Now it looks like Islington Council have partnered with Verrus to make this a reality. But is it any good? Well.... nearly. Let's take a look. The Initial Impression The QR code is fairly clear and I was able to scan it without issue…
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It's been a while since I did a screenshot based review of a mobile app. I was gratified when QR Pal asked me to review their new app. First thing's first, this is a great idea for a QR Scanner. It saves all your scans - so you can retrieve them by category, it checks to see if links are safe to click on, it allows you to share scans with friends, and it also has a gameification element. But…
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We're getting a few more museums lined up with QRpedia - and busy working on new features. I just wanted to update you on some interesting developments. QRpedia was presented by Roger at Wikimania - it seemed to go down a storm! The Children's Museum of Indianapolis are adding more QR codes. A lovely blog from Lori about seeing people scan the codes. A bug in Wikipedia has been…
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I spend yesterday wandering around London and, as is my wont, spotted some QR codes which I think may interest readers of this blog. Tracey Emin The Hayward Gallery are having a Tracey Emin retrospective. At the start of the exhibition is this rather odd QR code. Why odd? Three main reasons. It leads directly to a 14MB MP3 file. The code is really quite small considering it's a…
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I spotted this poster today, encouraging people to search for the Twitter hashtag "#Transformers". Wouldn't it make sense to use a QR code as well? That way people could quickly scan, and be taken straight to the discussion, rather than have to fire up Twitter and do a manual search. As it happens, it's slightly tricky to make a QR code which searches for a Twitter hashtag. There are two…
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An edited version of this paid-for post appeared at Moo.com on the 7th of June QR codes are awesome! I mean, you may think your moo mini-cards are pretty funky - but they're nothing without a QR code. Why do you hand your card over to someone? You want the recipient to plug your contact details into their address book, right? So you give them a bit of card and then you expect them to tap…
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