hypulp: Barcodes linking to online content III

Barcodes linking to online content III

Filed under: Magazine design & Navigation & Online

In Japan, more than 68 million people can access internet from their mobile phones; book trains, airplanes, cinema, you name it, you can probably do it from your keitai (mobile in Japanese). However, some web URLs can be quite tedious to enter on the limited keyboard of a mobile phone. Enters the QR-code.
Those 2D barcodes released in 1994 are set to replace traditional barcodes on all products on the long term; they can encode more data than previously possible and are still decryptable even when part of the symbol is damaged. In Japan, they have been assigned many roles: one of them is to help us input web addresses on our mobile phones and jump from printed content to online content. They can be photographed and decrypted by more than 50% of all mobile phones on the market in Japan (87M), that almost all sport digital cameras. A few seconds are needed to take a close-up photo of the code which can be decrypted. You are automatically offered to launch this address in the phone browser.
I found 2 of those codes in my magazines this month. But the trend started a few months ago. Many more applications have been found for this printed QR-code / keitai duo. I will detail a few more in upcoming entries. See also: Sem@code

Relax Magazine April 2004

another QR code

by Paul | 22 March 2004

5 Comments added

1. On 24 March 2004, Darin ten Bruggencate said:

I just read this article, and I have been living in Japan for two years and this is the first I've heard of this (granded I don't really read that many magazines other then architecture ones...). So, first thing I do is get my phone out and try and take a picture of the "bar code" on the screen. Well, I'm able to take a picture, but I wasn't prompted to do anything with it.
I'm guessing this is a feature that may only be available with Docomo phones (which wouldn't be that surprizing) and since I have an au, it may not work. But, I do have a pretty top of the line phone sportind a 2 mega pixel camera, and for the money I paid for it, I'd expect it to do this.
Do you have any more idea as to what phones this will work on? Perhaps the end-user needs to download some stuff fist. I'll hop on EZWeb now and look around to see what I can find available for download . :)

2. On 24 March 2004, Paul - hypulp said:

Hey Darin, you and I have the same phone, AU's A5403CA. Well you are in the other 50% with me. Most of Docomo phones (if not all by now) and a good portion of Vodafone ones on offer at the moment can decrypt those codes. But AU has only just started to add the function to their phones starting in the A55 series (the latest one coming out in April). We are from the previous generation... and no software can be added. It has to be installed by the manufacturer.

3. On 16 April 2004, Adam said:

I'm not sure I understand all the hype about QR code, Paul.

"QR code" is just Denso Wave's trade name for their proprietary 2D encoding format. It appears less efficient than a competing standard in the public domain, the Data Matrix format (see http://www.rvsi.com/acuitycimatrix/index.htm for more information). Data Matrix is supported by an ISO standard, ISO/IEC16022, and a US military specification, MIL-STD-130L.

Of course, you couldn't very well expect Denso Wave's salespeople to tell their prospects that there's a superior, free alternative that can be used by anyone, for any purpose, without any sort of licensing fee whatsoever. But I can. ; . )

4. On 16 April 2004, Paul - hypulp said:

Yes, Adam. Unfortunately for RVSI, those 2D barcodes are known as QR-codes in Japan and they seem to be the industry standard... We use them at work, I see them at the combini... I see them on business cards (just today), I have them in my Tokyo Map linking each page to restaurant and lodging infos about the area drawn on that very page, I see them on book covers (don't have a pen and paper but want to remember the reference of the book - type of situation), I see them on websites promoting their mobile content. And I gotta make a t-shirt with a big one printed on it. I give it only a few months before the first QR-code tatoos and graphic design students using it in their projects (*bad taste alert*) in the manner of the UPC barcode.

5. On 08 February 2006, Christian said:

Adam, "QR Code is open in the sense that the specification of QR Code is disclosed and that the patent right owned by Denso Wave is not exercised"

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